Plenty has happened since the last time local-boy-done-good Benjamin Lake made a local appearance at the Adrian Mann Theatre.
In those 18 months, he has gained a leading part in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera, lost about nine stone and, as a result, has an even more gargantuan voice to show for it.
"Everybody has noticed a difference," says the Ewell-based opera singer, "I have lost four of those stone in the past few months and, when the weight disappears from the neck, the vocal chords get more of an airing.
"My top Cs are clearer, more sustained, and I have a much richer sound. I don't think I have really lost anything as a result. I have been singing for a long time, and a lot of it is to do with stance and breathing but, while Pavarotti was a big man, Domingo wasn't and had an equally solid voice."
Industrial-strength discipline has been employed to mark this change, not to mention the eight stone of costume that Lake has to wear every day by playing Piangi in Phantom. ("You have all that costume, the stage lights, make-up, and also I have to climb up an elephant in every show!" he explains.)
Lake made his name in Jerry Springer - The Opera, playing God, for which he earned a Best West End Newcomer of the Year award. After staying with the show for Edinburgh, he toured it across the UK and remains the cast member to have notched up the most performances.
What he has prepared for Sunday's show is a mix of musical theatre (Bring Him Home - Les Miserables, Memory - Cats), opera (Nessum Dorma, Verdi's Brindisi), and several popular ballads.
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You may also have seen Lake in BBC2's Kombat Opera, a comedy which was lavished with praise by some critics and panned by others. It was a high culture meets low culture' concept whereby each episode was an opera about lowbrow subjects such as binge drinking.
Lake starred in all the half-hour episodes, leading in two, in which he played a gay interior designer and a cop (which involved singing opera on the streets of Manchester at 3am on a Sunday).
More TV work is in the offing and, while he is halfway through his 12-month contract at Haymarket's Her Majesty's Theatre, Lake admits, "you are always looking at the next show", and hopes to expand his repertoire elsewhere.
Benjamin Lake; Adrian Mann Theatre, Nescot, Reigate Road, Ewell, April 6, 3pm, £10, call 0208 643 6669.
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