Girl Power!

We chat to Gary Barlow and Denise Welch about the latest rendition of Calendar Girls The Musical and how it’s not actually all about bare bums…

- Janey Swanson

Almost 20 years ago, the Yorkshire ladies of Rylston & District WI caused an uproar when they decided to raise funds for charity by stripping off and posing naked for a calendar.

Their “alternative” calendar sold by the lorryload all over the world, triggered thousands of copycat charity calendars and inspired a best-selling book and an award-winning stage play and film.

And now Gary Barlow and Tim Firth, writer of the film and the stage play, have written the musical version of the ladies’ story, which is currently enjoying sell-out performances in theatres all over the UK.

“Tim asked me to work on Calendar Girls The Musical with him about seven years ago and my initial reaction was a very definite ‘No’,” says Gary, who I’m interviewing in Burnsall Village Hall, meeting place of Rylston & District WI and scene of the famous photoshoot.

“However, Tim persisted and, after my first visit to meet the original Calendar Girls, I gave in!”