RIP Rob Guest

LEADING Australian theatre star Rob Guest has died in Melbourne after suffering a massive stroke.

Guest, 58, who had been starring in the musical Wicked, died at Melbourne's St Vincent's Hospital last night, a spokeswoman for the hospital said.

Guest was one of the good guys of Australian music and will be missed professionally and personally, close friend and co-star Marina Prior says.

He was starring as the Wizard of Oz in the musical Wicked, playing at Melbourne's Regent Theatre.

Prior starred with Guest in Les Miserables in the late 1980s, and The Phantom of the Opera, for which he had the world record as longest serving Phantom.

Prior said the music theatre fraternity was devastated by Guest's death.

"He had an amazing ability to gain the audience's empathy straight away, and he was incredibly charismatic," she told Fairfax Radio Network.

"As the Phantom he had this extraordinary magnetism and charisma.

"He's really going to be terribly, terribly missed, professionally, personally as well, because he really is one of the good guys."

Prior said Guest never missed a performance as the Phantom.

"We used to always laugh that he would go on in an iron lung if he had to," she said.

"I think that's just why everybody has been so shocked, he's such a robust and vital person.

"I only saw him about a month ago and he looked fantastic, he looked really well and healthy.

"He's one of those people that gives 400 per cent and ... he's a man of great integrity, a great family man."

A St Vincent's Hospital spokeswoman released a statement on behalf of Guest's family, saying he passed away peacefully overnight, surrounded by his family and friends.

Guest was born in Britain but enjoyed fame as a pop star in New Zealand in the 1970s and 1980s and spent a decade in Las Vegas before his stage musical career took him to Australia.

Guest is best known for playing the Phantom in Phantom of the Opera for most of the 1990s in Australia.

He was the world's longest serving Phantom having played the role a record 2289 performances over seven years in front of Australian and New Zealand audiences.

Before the news of Guest's death, Wicked producer John Frost yesterday said the cast from the musical, in which he plays the Wonderful Wizard of Oz, were "shocked" that the actor had suffered a stroke.

"Rob Guest is one of Australian music theatre's biggest stars: there have been few bigger in our lifetime," Frost said in a statement yesterday.

"He is, nonetheless, the most easy-going of stars. He may have top billing but at all times he comes across to us - producers, fellow cast members and backstage crew - as an irrepressible, always cheerful optimist.

"An all round good bloke. All of us who know him are shocked."

Guest also played Captain Von Trapp in The Sound of Music, starred in productions of Les Miserables and hosted the short-lived 90s TV game show Man O'Man.


Apparently he was taken off life support late last night after his family had arrived from NZ. Such a loss.

RIP Rob Guest

LEADING Australian theatre star Rob Guest has died in Melbourne after suffering a massive stroke.

Guest, 58, who had been starring in the musical Wicked, died at Melbourne's St Vincent's Hospital last night, a spokeswoman for the hospital said.

Guest was one of the good guys of Australian music and will be missed professionally and personally, close friend and co-star Marina Prior says.

He was starring as the Wizard of Oz in the musical Wicked, playing at Melbourne's Regent Theatre.

Prior starred with Guest in Les Miserables in the late 1980s, and The Phantom of the Opera, for which he had the world record as longest serving Phantom.

Prior said the music theatre fraternity was devastated by Guest's death.

"He had an amazing ability to gain the audience's empathy straight away, and he was incredibly charismatic," she told Fairfax Radio Network.

"As the Phantom he had this extraordinary magnetism and charisma.

"He's really going to be terribly, terribly missed, professionally, personally as well, because he really is one of the good guys."

Prior said Guest never missed a performance as the Phantom.

"We used to always laugh that he would go on in an iron lung if he had to," she said.

"I think that's just why everybody has been so shocked, he's such a robust and vital person.

"I only saw him about a month ago and he looked fantastic, he looked really well and healthy.

"He's one of those people that gives 400 per cent and ... he's a man of great integrity, a great family man."

A St Vincent's Hospital spokeswoman released a statement on behalf of Guest's family, saying he passed away peacefully overnight, surrounded by his family and friends.

Guest was born in Britain but enjoyed fame as a pop star in New Zealand in the 1970s and 1980s and spent a decade in Las Vegas before his stage musical career took him to Australia.

Guest is best known for playing the Phantom in Phantom of the Opera for most of the 1990s in Australia.

He was the world's longest serving Phantom having played the role a record 2289 performances over seven years in front of Australian and New Zealand audiences.

Before the news of Guest's death, Wicked producer John Frost yesterday said the cast from the musical, in which he plays the Wonderful Wizard of Oz, were "shocked" that the actor had suffered a stroke.

"Rob Guest is one of Australian music theatre's biggest stars: there have been few bigger in our lifetime," Frost said in a statement yesterday.

"He is, nonetheless, the most easy-going of stars. He may have top billing but at all times he comes across to us - producers, fellow cast members and backstage crew - as an irrepressible, always cheerful optimist.

"An all round good bloke. All of us who know him are shocked."

Guest also played Captain Von Trapp in The Sound of Music, starred in productions of Les Miserables and hosted the short-lived 90s TV game show Man O'Man.


Apparently he was taken off life support late last night after his family had arrived from NZ. Such a loss.