Luke Newton Trades Bridgerton for Off-Broadway in House of McQueen
The actor dug deep into the fashion archives play the legendary, late Alexander McQueen.
“I need to stop using ‘Lee.’” Luke Newton tells W over Zoom on a recent Friday morning. The 32-year-old actor is referring to Lee Alexander McQueen, the late designer and mastermind behind his namesake brand, Alexander McQueen. Newton plays the eminent figure, who still looms so large in fashion’s imagination 15 years after his untimely death by suicide, in House of McQueen, a new Off Broadway show opening at the Mansion at Hudson Yards on September 9.
The performance marks Newton’s New York theater debut—though he got his start on the stage, having been discovered in an amateur production of Billy Elliott before becoming the global star he is today with his role on Bridgerton as the dreamy Colin. To prepare, Newton assigned himself extensive homework, watching documentaries, reading books, and dissecting old interviews to better understand the beloved designer. He’s come to the point where he feels like he knows McQueen. But of course, he doesn’t, and he wants to respect that boundary. “It feels overly personal,” Newton says of using the designer’s first name. “I spoke to someone yesterday who knew him, and she said only his friends called him Lee. Others called him McQueen.”
Newton, as McQueen, onstage alongside Catherine LeFrere, who plays Isabella Blow.
It’s worth noting that Newton continues to refer to McQueen as Lee throughout the rest of our interview, but not in a way that seems invasive or too familiar. The actor clearly has an immense reverence for the designer, which may be a necessary prerequisite to take on the show's demands. Eschewing boundaries like time and space, House of McQueen jumps through McQueen’s life, spanning nearly four decades in just 120 minutes and traveling from East London to Savile Row, Milan to Central Saint Martins, Ibiza to the offices of Alexander McQueen and Givenchy, and beyond.
Alexander McQueen takes his bow after the Givenchy by Alexander McQueen Ready to Wear spring/summer 2001 fashion show in Paris.
While Newton remains in character throughout the show’s two acts, much of the rest of the cast swap out wigs to portray multiple roles. The stage itself is minimal, consisting of just two platforms that rise and fall in accordance with the story’s needs. But 1,000 square feet of LED screens, placed behind and above the actors, help to set each scene. If it all sounds a bit overwhelming, it is—enough to induce vertigo among the audience members. But Newton is there to ground the production. With his shaved head, baggy jeans, and oversize T-shirt, he bears a striking resemblance to the designer, bringing a sense of humanity to the man often admired as a god.
Newton and Jonina Thorsteinsdottir, who portrays McQueen’s sister, Janet
Newton admits he wasn’t especially familiar with McQueen before taking on this role. “I knew who he was. I knew of his impact, I think.” He is unconvincing. But prior knowledge be damned, because Newton more than made up for his shortcomings after officially joining the production. If there were a university course on the designer’s life, Newton would be the teacher’s pet, having devoured the syllabus. “I was completely consumed by research, particularly in the initial stages,” he says. Eventually, Sam Helfrich, the show’s director, had to tell Newton to cool it.
“Everyone would come into rehearsal and say, ‘I found this article about when Lee and Tom Ford first met’ or ‘I found this article with a statement from his mother,’” Newton says. “There was just so much information. In the end, Sam was like, ‘OK, we’ve talked about everything we possibly can, now let go of it and focus solely on the script.”
Alexander McQueen with a model closing the Spring/Summer 1998 collection for his eponymous brand in London
Written by Darrah Cloud, the play explores the distance and dichotomy between McQueen’s outward persona and inner life. As Newton found in his research, McQueen was relatively ubiquitous during his time in the spotlight, and his digital footprint is significant. But in approaching the role, Newton aimed to bring “the real Lee” to life as much as the version projected onto the fashion industry in the ’90s and 2000s. Throughout the two-hour play, the story returns to a BBC interview between the designer and his mother, portrayed by Emily Skinner. Newton plays haughtier in these interruptions, armed with a quippy response to each interview question. In contrast, more intimate scenes—that depict McQueen’s teenage years at home or his relationship with mentor Isabella Blow—unveil a more insecure or unsure Lee.
Newton with a model, played by Thorsteinsdottir.
It was in these private moments that Newton found a bit more freedom. No matter how many times someone watches the 2018 documentary McQueen, they will never truly know what the designer was like behind closed doors. “That helped take the weight off finding my own version of Lee,” Newton says.
Still, McQueen’s legacy looms large. Each night at the stage door, audience members approach Newton with McQueen stories of their own. “There's so much love out there for him,” Newton says. “Everyone who is exposed to his genius feels connected to him.” Especially Newton. “I feel very, very lucky that I get to step into the shoes of a genius every night and experience what that feels like for two hours.”
