Fisherman’s Friends cross the pond for debut of musical in Toronto

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The Fisherman’s Friends were about to get all misty while playing tourists in Ontario on Saturday.

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The six sea shanty singers from the small Cornwall fishing village of Port Isaac were enroute to see Niagara Falls for the first time before attending Sunday afternoon’s North American debut of Fisherman’s Friends: The Musical at Toronto’s Royal Alex Theatre.

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“We looked at the map when we knew we were coming over to Toronto, and saw it was nearby,” explained group member Jon Cleave AKA “Cleavie” after lunch at the Niagara-On-The-Lake pub The Angel Inn.

The group will be in their seats Sunday for the musical, which is scheduled to run until Jan. 15 (check mirvish.com for tickets), but will join the cast on stage for the curtain call rendition of the Cornish national anthem, Trelawney.

“We’re all very excited about the musical because we love it,” said Cleave, who is a writer, runs a shop that sells “nauticalia” in Port Isaac and was in the village’s lifeboat crew in his younger years.

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“It really captures the heart and soul of our group. I think part of the success of what we do is down to us and part of the success is down to the songs themselves. If you’re enjoying these songs maybe that’s because you’re singing along to the words and tunes of your own ancestors.”

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The group’s story — only one remains a lobster fisherman — of six friends from Port Isaac becoming singing sensations with a gold album, and Glastonbury and Queen’s Diamond Jubilee performances, after Universal Music began recording and distributing their songs in 2010, led to a popular 2019 British film, streamed on Netflix in 2020, and a 2022 sequel Fisherman’s Friends One and All.

The musical was adapted from the 2019 screenplay and had its world premiere at The Hall for Cornwall in Truro in October 2021 and began an extensive tour in Sept. 2022.

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“We started off in the early 1990s,” said Cleave of their humble start. “When we first got together five of the guys were fishermen. And the rest of us were friends of fishermen.”

Strangely, they’ve never toured Canada but Cleave says they’d “love to” with plans to record a new album in the fall.

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Meanwhile, he realizes they are here while our country anticipates Sunday’s FIFA World Cup men’s match between Canada and Croatia (11 a.m., TSN) and plans to find a pub and watch it if he can.

“Hopefully, we will,” he said, declaring he’d root for Canada.

“Croatia are a good team. They have a very diminutive mid-field player called Luka Modric. He plays for Real Madrid and he’s a tremendously good player but he’s very annoying ‘cause he’s small and he needs to be squashed. Canada will have to play very well to beat them, if I’m honest, but with the support of The Fisherman’s Friends who knows what might happen.”

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