Greatest Days, a big-screen musical featuring the music of Take That, has arrived in cinemas across the country after its London premiere on Thursday.
Boyband member Howard Donald hailed “the power of music” ahead of the opening of the film on Friday, which was based on the 2017 stage production called The Band.
Greatest Days follows the lives of four women who were all big fans as children and reunite to see them live.
The film, directed by Coky Giedroyc, stars comedian Aisling Bea, Jayde Adams, Alice Lowe and Amaka Okafor – with Take That members Gary Barlow, Mark Owen and Donald serving as executive producers.
Original cast members for the production were selected through the BBC reality show Let It Shine.
Speaking at the world premiere of Greatest Days in London on Thursday, Donald told the PA news agency: “It’s obviously amazing.
“Music in general – not just Take That’s music – touches people’s hearts, creates friendships, gets people through difficult times, brings people together.
“The power of music is so, so powerful.”
Owen said the film was “really special” because Take That had been a “passport to the world” allowing him to have multiple international experiences.
“It’s really special because when we first started it was before the days of social media and all that and there were people that would tell us that they learnt English through our songs,” he told PA.
“It was great, when we were turning up in those days – for me it was a passport to the world, the band because I lived in this little town called Oldham, and I hadn’t really been outside of Oldham.
“Then I joined the band and I started to go, first to London, then eventually we went to Germany, then we went to Japan, then we went to America.
“I was like ‘look at my passport, I’ve got all these stamps’.”
Bea added that the film was also a “love letter” to her character, an NHS nurse called Rachel, who is “passionate” about her job and feels the need to revive the “connection with her friends”.
Thursday’s premiere also featured an exclusive performance by Take That in Leicester Square’s Gardens.
