The West End star talks Billy, Jamie and that time Olivia Colman taught him to knit
It’s a sunny Friday afternoon in the West End as the brilliant sunshine of a spring just finding her footing bore down on the Edwardian exteriors of Shaftsbury Avenue’s historic theatres. Smiling out from a protruding turquoise poster, face beaming and mug beat, Layton Williams dressed in a navy blue school uniform basks over the confused tourists meandering their way up the crowded street. His face has become familiar to most of us London dwellers having graced the side of buses and most of the underground system since taking to the titular Everybody’s Talking About Jamie role earlier this year.
He’s no stranger to firsts having made headlines a decade ago as it was announced that he was to be the first black performer to take on the role of Billy Elliot. In many ways, he’s built his career on that trailblazer status with his exciting turn as Kylie on Beautiful People being the first time many young queer people of colour saw themselves on screen.
Turning onto the cobblestones of Rupert Street and through the dimly lit stage door, Ifan Llewelyn sat down for a dressing room natter with the child star turned West End heavyweight.
Performing seems like something you were always born to do. Do you think that’s the case?
Probably, but I didn’t realise that I was until late really. People start dancing when they’re like six or seven years old, and I’m glad I didn’t because then I might have lost a love for it. I stumbled across it, the performing acting thing, when I was maybe eleven, and then I got into the industry quite quick. I loved my Spice Girls, I was a huge MJ fan (I know we can’t really talk about him anymore, he’s cancelled) back in the day. I was always busting out the moves at the christenings, the weddings. The first one on the dance floor and the last one to leave. It was just destined to be, and now I think what the hell else would I do? I’m sure I’d make ends meet somehow, but I wouldn’t know what else to put myself to really.
You grew up in Manchester; it must have been a good place to grow up for a kid that was a bit different?
Well, you have Manchester then you have Greater Manchester. Burry was the last stop on the tram, and I’m from a council estate. It was fine for me, it was okay, but there weren’t a lot of queer people running around the street. It’s rough, everyone’s got their ways, and being different is still different. You know? I did feel like I blended in for a long time, and it wasn’t until I got to London that I was like oh, okay, we can be a bit different. It’s a SMALL town. Back in the day, I’d have a Burry wardrobe and a London wardrobe, changing on the train because I thought if I wear this stuff in Burry, I’d get docked. NOW these bitches be coming for these looks. My brothers and sister, seven brothers and one sister, they used to cuss me. Roadmen wear Ugg Boots now, but bitch I’ve been wearing Ugg Boots since… NOT that I’d wear them now.
Having stumbled across the performing stuff, it was only one or two years before you were starring in a West End show.
That’s what brought me down here. We love title roles apparently (chuckles). I just fell into it, started my training for it. Went to this open audition, one thing led to the next and roughly two years later I got on the stage and played the part for two years. It was too late to turn back, I was already into it, but I loved it.
Do you remember what those first weeks on stage were like?
Oh my god. I remember my opening night, very much like my opening night for Jamie, I was just so shook. I had a wave of adrenaline and the nerves were unreal, but because I didn’t have anything to compare it to, so I just stepped out there at the Victoria Palace Theatre at only twelve/thirteen years old, I thought I just have to put this show on now. It was like living a dream. I feel the same now as I did when I was a kid. A lot of responsibility but it’s very rewarding.
For a child as well! What’s the one thing people don’t consider about being a West End kid?
How hard it is, as a child, to have that pressure. As well as doing the shows, you’ve got to do your GCSEs, your tutoring, and you’ve got to train for the part to keep cute. There were days I’d have ballet classes, dialect classes, yoga, pilates, having to keep fit, along with everything else, and doing shows. It’s not really let’s go out and doss about on the estate. I use to spend my time dicking around Dickie Bird Estate playing knock-door-run, and the next thing you know I’m in the West End having to work.
The press surrounding your casting in Billy Elliot had a lot to do with your race. Was that a conversation you were aware was going on?
I knew I was the first mixed-race black guy to play the part. I knew there’d been an Asian boy beforehand so to me it was just doing my job. I was just booking these roles. You lot can say what you want to say, but no one would ever say it to my face.
Around that time you were also filming Beautiful People, right?
It was whilst I was doing Billy Elliot, the casting directors were fab and let me have a little break. They knew how much of an opportunity it was going to be for me, so they gave me seven weeks off to go and do the shoot, so I took a little break to film it. With Olivia Colman who’s now a superstar, she taught me how to knit. If I’m correct in my facts that was one of her first leading roles in a SitCom which was a huge deal for her. It was a huge deal for me because I’d never been on TV.
You were definitely one of the first camp kids, maybe now we’d call them queer kids, we saw on television. Did you feel that something new was going on?
Because I was a kid I didn’t really think that. As a child you’re changing things, you’re moving things. Like with Billy Elliot, I didn’t think me being a black boy was a big deal because I was a kid and I was just doing my job. The same when I went into Beautiful People, but I had an idea that there wasn’t a show like it that I’d seen. I hadn’t been represented, I was doing the representing. It was way before it’s time, like Glee before Glee. That show could have gone on and on. I often hear how that show has helped people come out. They just felt like they could see themselves.
When that show came to an end. Was it hard moving on?
I had to go back to state school. I felt like I had this other life on the West End, on a TV set, filming at Pinewood Studios, and then BAM. Back to reality, back in Burry, back on my council estate, back in state school. It was soul destroying. I got by because I do, and I could put on a brave face but that was the lowest point of my life. You wouldn’t have known it. I got by. I had confidence so I could fight back, but I was very much back in the closet. Sometimes when I’m playing Jamie I just wish I could’ve been more like him. I wish I would’ve gone back to school and owned it. “What bitch? Watch me tonight on the BBC.” *Snap*
That must have made you such a target.
I was, but since I was a bit of a bad bitch, I owned my situation. I surrounded myself with some close friends and stuck with them. But was bursting to run away again, and I did. Filming the second season of Beautiful People I got back into London. Whilst I was filming that I thought I’m not going back, this is me, I’m staying. I was working with this line producer called Maria and they were going to take in a kid, foster a child, and they saw me and thought I needed someone to stay whilst I was down there. I’ve been living with these two fifty-year-old lesbians for the past ten years. We’re a modern queer family. We’ve had the best time! They raised me through my teenage years, from fourteen when I moved back to London, and I went as a junior to Italia Conti. Whilst I was going my student years I was also doing Bad Education. I was training but I was also working. She’s busy.
Then you do a few touring productions?
Fucking hell, a few? After I finished training I then went on to tour back to back.
The theatre scene is pretty queer-friendly. Being someone who’s made a career on camp roles, was there any unease around that?
I’ve shown them I can switch it up, play roles that aren’t queens. I think I’ve done that on stage, maybe not necessarily in TV and film yet. Do you ever hear about a straight actor complaining about playing straight roles? Then why the fuck am I going to play when I’m playing these queer roles. If I can do it, and I can do it well, and I can do it better than the guy next to me. Book me. I need to pay my bills, I need to get my flat together, and I love my work.
In that respect, Everybody’s Talking About Jamie seems like an obvious conclusion. You’d played two other camp school kids, why not add a third!
Why NOT. This is the thing that I don’t want people to get twisted, and I’m sure you know this. Being a queer kid doesn’t mean you have the same story. All these characters have a campness and a fabulosity, but it doesn’t mean we’re all the same. You don’t walk into G-A-Y and every person in there is the same person. They’re just all so different. This was the quickest job I’ve ever booked. I was supposed to be doing another job which was fucking major and I was so gassed to do it, but then this came along and I knew in my heart that I couldn’t turn it down. I had a phone call on the Tuesday, and on the Sunday I got the part. I auditioned for this originally, so they’d seen me before, but the timing wasn’t right.
It feels like your face is literally everywhere.
It’s weird. I don’t think it’s ever something I’ll get used to. I’m going to blink and it’s going to be over.
It must make dating a NIGHTMARE.
You know, I’ve not been dating in a minute. But these past couple of weeks… she’s been back. I had a date yesterday and it’s all going good. I’m back on the scene now, so I hope that love is just around the corner. It’s not that people aren’t gassing me up, but if you know you know. Have you heard of Raya, the celebrity dating app? I went on that and it was really helpful because it just got my mojo back. When you’re working it’s hard to meet people. But I feel like it’s coming soon. Soon come my big squeeze.
Oh, honey! Right, so rapid-fire questions. Role in a musical you’re dying to play.
I can’t tell people. If I put it out and it doesn’t happen that’s awkward for me. There are a few roles out there I’d love to snatch.
Fair enough. Someone on the West End you’d love to work with.
Katherine McPhee who’s in Waitress, from Smash. I think she’s so jokes. She has all the banter on Twitter.
Movie remake you’d love to be in.
The Little Mermaid. I’d LOVE to be Sebastian the crab.
I definitely see that for you. Fave nightspot in London.
You know where I like a good boogie? Dalston Superstore. Sink The Pink and Savage are also so much fun. Full of love.
Fave drag queen out there right now.
It has to be Bianca Del Rio, of course! I’m SO excited.
What would your drag name be?
It’s always been Katrina. From Hurricane Katrina, but I don’t want to make a joke out of all of the deaths.
What’s the pre-show ritual?
I beat my face. I warm up. I put my diffuser on. Sometimes when I’m feeling like oh my god, I just say ‘Slay Bitch’.
And bitch DOES slay. You can keep up with Layton on Instagram and Twitter (@LaytonWilliams), and be sure to watching him in action in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie running now at The Apollo Theatre.
