Kerry Ellis

Kerry Jane Ellis, born on 6 May 1979 in Haughley, near Stowmarket, Suffolk, is an English actress and singer whose career has spanned musical theatre, solo recording, and concert performance. The daughter of Sandra Ann Reed and Terry John Ellis, she attended dance classes at the Ann Holland School of Theatre Dance from a young age and performed in local shows and pantomimes. Her first stage role came at age nine, when she played a Munchkin in The Wizard of Oz at the Wolsey Theatre in Ipswich. She also participated in the National Youth Music Theatre during the summer of 1990. A visit to the West End production of Les Misérables for her thirteenth birthday solidified her ambition to pursue a career on stage. She cites Liza Minnelli, Elaine Paige, and Barbra Streisand as early musical influences, and has credited fellow Suffolk actress Ruthie Henshall as a formative inspiration.

Ellis attended Stowmarket High School before leaving at sixteen to enroll at Laine Theatre Arts, an independent performing arts college, where she completed a three-year national diploma in musical theatre, graduating in 1998. Fellow musical theatre actress Louise Dearman was in the same year at Laine. Prior to graduation, Ellis had already appeared in professional pantomime productions for E&B Productions, including Dick Whittington in 1995, Aladdin in 1996, and the title role in Cinderella in 1997 at the Cliffs Pavilion in Southend-on-Sea.

Following her graduation in 1998, Ellis became first understudy to Marti Webb on a UK concert tour of The Magic of the Musicals, stepping in on several occasions during Webb's absence. In 1999 she took a hiatus to work as lead vocalist aboard the cruise ship MS Voyager of the Seas, spending nine months travelling across the Caribbean before departing the ship in Los Angeles and spending three months travelling the United States. She subsequently returned to the concert tour. By November 1999 she had made her first television appearance on Children in Need for Pudsey the Musical and was featured in a jingle for Capital FM. She also appeared in a Gary Griffin-directed workshop production of Helen of Troy and played Mary in Merrily We Roll Along at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre.

Ellis made her West End debut in the 2001 Cameron Mackintosh revival of My Fair Lady, joining the production as swing and second understudy to Martine McCutcheon in the role of Eliza Doolittle after being scouted by agent Jonathan Greatorex. The production opened at the Lyttelton Theatre at the Royal National Theatre on 6 March 2001 before transferring to Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on 21 July 2001. Due to the illnesses of McCutcheon and first understudy Alexandra Jay, Ellis performed the role of Eliza Doolittle opposite Jonathan Pryce and Dennis Waterman on a total of five occasions, on one instance receiving only three hours of preparation before going on. She departed the production in July 2002.

During her run in My Fair Lady, Queen guitarist Brian May and music director Mike Dixon attended performances on two separate occasions, the second of which featured Ellis understudying the lead role. May anonymously encouraged her to audition for the original London cast of We Will Rock You, the jukebox musical he was developing. After seven auditions, Ellis secured the role of Meat, beginning performances on 14 May 2002. The role included the solo number "No-One but You (Only the Good Die Young)." She appeared with the cast on television programmes including Parkinson and at Party at the Palace, and is featured on the original London cast recording. Her run as Meat concluded on 17 April 2004. It was during this period that May began working with Ellis musically, laying the groundwork for her subsequent solo career.

Ellis went on to perform lead roles in a number of major West End productions, including Les Misérables, Oliver!, and Cats, as well as national tours and concert productions of Miss Saigon, Chess, The War of the Worlds, RENT, and Anything Goes. She appeared in Wicked both in the West End and on Broadway, with her Broadway appearance taking place in 2003. Her work across these productions brought her several awards and nominations.

As a solo recording artist, Ellis released the extended play Wicked in Rock in 2008, followed by the studio album Anthems in 2010, which reached number fifteen on the UK Albums Chart. Subsequent studio albums include the self-titled Kerry Ellis in 2014, Golden Days in 2017, and Feels Like Home in 2020. She also released the live album Acoustic by Candlelight in 2013. Ellis has performed in concerts worldwide and headlined solo tours including Anthems: The Tour and The Born Free Tour.

Beyond her performing career, Ellis is involved in charity work for the Born Free Foundation alongside Brian May and serves as patron of several arts organisations. In 2019, she received an honorary fellowship from the University of Suffolk.