John Owen-Jones

John Owen-Jones is a Welsh musical theatre actor and singer, born on 5 May 1971 in Burry Port, Carmarthenshire. He trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London, graduating in 1994 with a BA (Hons) in Acting. Before his professional career, he was a member of Llanelli Youth Theatre and was educated at Glan-y-Mor Comprehensive School. He has been married since 1999 to Teresa, a primary school teacher, and the couple have two children and reside in Surrey.

Owen-Jones is best known for his repeated portrayals of Jean Valjean in Les Misérables and the title role in The Phantom of the Opera. His professional stage work began in 1995, when he appeared in Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music at the National Theatre alongside Judi Dench, Patricia Hodge, Joanna Riding, and Siân Phillips, playing the liebeslieder. That same year he appeared in The Ladies Paradise at the RNT Studio and sang in the choir at the 10th Anniversary Concert of Les Misérables at the Royal Albert Hall. In 1998, at the age of 26, he became the youngest person to take on the role of Jean Valjean full-time in the London production, having previously understudied the part and performed the roles of Factory Foreman, Feuilly, Grantaire, and Enjolras.

In 2000, Owen-Jones performed in The Pirates of Penzance and Much Ado About Nothing during the season at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre. The following year he was cast as the Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera in London, a role he held for three and a half years and nearly 1,400 performances, departing on 26 February 2005 as the longest-running London Phantom at that time. His final performance in that run was opposite Rachel Barrell. Additional stage credits include Antipholus in The Boys from Syracuse and Lorenzo in The Merchant of Venice at Harrogate Theatre, Herr Zeller in The Sound of Music, Cléante in The Hypochondriac, Valère in Le Médecin Volant at the West Yorkshire Playhouse, and a performance in Uprooted at the Tricycle Theatre.

Owen-Jones returned to Les Misérables at the Queen's Theatre in London on 27 June 2005, remaining in the production until his contract concluded on 6 October 2007. During a break from that run in May 2006, he played Gaylord Ravenal in Show Boat at the Royal Albert Hall, the first fully staged musical performed at that venue, which ran from 10 to 25 June 2006. Following the end of his West End contract, he traveled to the United States to perform Valjean on Broadway, exchanging productions with Drew Sarich. Owen-Jones began Broadway performances on 23 October 2007 and remained until the show concluded its Broadway run in January 2008, representing his Broadway credit with Les Misérables between 2006 and 2014.

He next played Valjean on the 25th Anniversary International Touring production of Les Misérables, which opened on 12 December 2009 in Cardiff and closed on 2 October 2010 at the Barbican Theatre in London. Owen-Jones returned to The Phantom of the Opera in London on 1 November 2010, with his first performance back opposite Sofia Escobar, continuing in the role until 10 December 2011. From March 2012, he played the Phantom on the show's 25th Anniversary UK tour opposite Katie Hall, departing that September and being replaced by Earl Carpenter. He also toured the UK in The Three Phantoms with Earl Carpenter.

On 16 December 2010, Owen-Jones appeared at the Royal Variety Performance at the London Palladium as part of a Valjean Quartet alongside Alfie Boe, Colm Wilkinson, and Simon Bowman, performing "Bring Him Home." The group had previously performed together at the 25th Anniversary concert of Les Misérables at the O2 Arena, and a recording of that performance was released as a UK single. At the 2011 Royal Variety Performance, held at The Lowry in Manchester on 5 December, Owen-Jones performed the title song from The Phantom of the Opera alongside Nicole Scherzinger and former Phantoms Simon Bowman, Earl Carpenter, and Ramin Karimloo. He also performed at the 25th anniversary production of The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall in October 2011, alongside Karimloo, Colm Wilkinson, Peter Jöback, and Anthony Warlow, and sang at the 25th anniversary gala of the New York production with Ramin Karimloo, Hugh Panaro, and Peter Jöback.

In January 2014, Owen-Jones traveled to New York to record the concept album for a new Broadway musical, An American Victory, alongside Hugh Panaro, Ruthie Henshall, and Alexander Gemignani, among others, with the production to be directed by Larry Blank. He returned to The Phantom of the Opera in the West End from September 2015 through January 2016 at Her Majesty's Theatre. He subsequently returned to Broadway to reprise Valjean in the production's closing cast. Following that engagement, he appeared in a concert version of The Hired Man at Cadogan Hall. In 2021, he stepped in as an emergency replacement for Valjean in the West End production at the Sondheim Theatre.

Owen-Jones has released six studio albums. His first release was a five-track EP titled Hallelujah in late 2006, followed by a self-titled album that same year featuring material from Les Misérables and The Phantom of the Opera, including a trio with Michael Ball and Bryn Terfel. His third album, Unmasked, was released on 16 April 2012. Rise followed in 2015, featuring musical theatre tracks, hymns, and Welsh language songs. Bring Him Home was released in 2016, and his sixth album, Spotlight, appeared on 15 February 2019. His television work includes appearances on The Bill, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, The South Bank Show, and Record Breakers, among others. In December 2004 he appeared as a featured soloist in a televised Christmas Concert alongside Michael Ball, and in May 2014 he appeared on The Elaine Paige Show with Trevor Nunn, Herbert Kretzmer, and Scarlett Strallen.