Ben Richards to Hop Aboard the West End's Priscilla

Ben Richards will join the cast of the West End’s Priscilla Queen of the Desert on June 1. Richards will play Tick alongside Don Gallagher, Oliver Thornton and John Bowe in the production, directed by Simon Phillips, at the Palace Theatre.

Richards is known for his TV roles on Britain’s popular dramas The Bill and Footballer’s Wives. He has appeared in the West End in Guys and Dolls, Grease, The Full Monty and Saturday Night Fever.

 Priscilla Queen of the Desert centers on three friends (two drag queens and a transsexual) who hop aboard a battered lavender bus (named Priscilla) and take their show to the middle of the Australian outback. But the trip does not go according to plan, and as the tagline says, they end of up on “a journey to the heart of fabulous.”

The musical will play Broadway next spring; opening night is scheduled for March 6, 2011.