The 30-year-old performer, who has recently finished a run of the Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd-Webber-written musical Evita at the London Palladium, was back in the island to deliver workshops for aspiring young actors and actresses currently rehearsing for The Ladies’ College’s own production of Evita – due to take place at the Princess Royal Centre for the Performing Arts in March.
Barney has come a long way since turning professional just over a decade ago.
Born in Guernsey, he first started dancing at the Avril Earl Dance & Theatre Arts Centre at the age of seven.
‘I just couldn’t sit still when I was a kid,’ he recalled.
‘I think I liked showing off, and that was it, I just stuck with it.’
He remains thankful for the sense of community and the opportunities Guernsey offered him as he persevered with his training during his teenage years.
‘It was something that was really special.
‘There were some great opportunities that allowed me to go off and see other things, in London but also just being around performing arts as whole.’
Aged 16, he made the ‘scary’ decision to venture off-island and pursue a professional performing career, attending Performers College in Essex.
There, it soon became apparent just how hard he would have to work if he was to be in with a chance of forging a professional career for himself.
‘The training was so intense,’ he said.
‘Every single day at 8am we had to do a ballet class, and I remember one day I was two minutes late, so I wasn’t allowed to participate in any of the classes for the rest of the day.
‘We were working from eight in the morning, and sometimes not finishing until eight or nine in the evening, and then you’d go home for a quick nap and you’re back again the following day.
‘It was very full on, but you just had to throw yourself into it.’
The intense schedule did come with its perks.
With the college handily located near to London, Barney often travelled to the capital to watch shows, and these served as a great source of inspiration for the budding young performer.
‘It was very, very helpful, it opened my eyes in terms of what to expect and what I was going to be doing,’
The hard work ultimately paid off, and Barney turned professional aged 19.
His first job was a UK tour with American actor and singer David Hasselhoff as part of a production of Last Night A DJ Saved My Life, while soon after he was part of a run of Bugsy Malone at the Lyric Theatre in Hammersmith.
He remembers both musicals fondly.
‘Last Night was hilarious and just an incredible all-round experience, doing a show in an arena with 4,500 people.
‘Bugsy Malone was definitely one of the shows where I have had the most fun, because it was so tongue-in-cheek.’
After further touring and West End work, he became part of the original UK cast of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, helping to build the hit musical from the ground up in Sheffield before its eventual West End transfer.
‘To be there from the very start, creating the dance routines, hearing the songs for the first time and working directly with the writers – that was really special,’ he said.
It was during this period that Barney landed what would become one of the most significant roles of his career, in Hamilton.
He successfully auditioned while commuting between Sheffield and London, eventually joining the original London cast when the show opened in the West End.
What followed was a remarkable six-to-seven-year stint with the global phenomenon.
‘Hamilton is one of those shows where, once you get in, you don’t really want to leave,’ he said.
‘Musically, movement-wise, storytelling-wise, it’s just on another level.’
During his time with the production, Barney had the rare opportunity to move between roles, including performing as King George, one of the show’s most memorable characters.
The success of Hamilton opened even more doors.
While still performing night after night, Barney was auditioning for new productions – a relentless schedule that eventually saw him juggling full-day rehearsals for Evita in east London with evening performances of Hamilton in the West End.
For five weeks, he rehearsed from morning to night, travelled across the city, performed a three-hour show, got a few hours’ sleep, and did it all again the next day.
‘That was tough,’ he admitted.
‘But when you love it, you just do it.’
Evita opened at the London Palladium to huge acclaim, and Barney described one particular number, Buenos Aires, as his favourite moment of the entire production.
‘It’s just pure joy to perform,’ he said.
‘You look across the stage and your friends are having the time of their lives too.
‘Those are the moments you really try to soak up.’
Even while appearing in Evita, Barney was already auditioning for his next major project – the stage adaptation of hit film The Greatest Showman.
He is now part of the original company developing the show alongside the film’s creators, Benj Pasek and Justin Paul.
‘To be in a room with the people who wrote that music, who also wrote La La Land and Dear Evan Hansen, it’s crazy,’ he said.
‘They’re right there with us, shaping everything.’
The production is due to begin next year with a seven-week run in Bristol, before an anticipated transfer to either London or Broadway.
Along the way, Barney has worked with a string of major names, including Lin-Manuel Miranda, Rachel Zegler, and even royalty and Hollywood stars who attended Hamilton during its original run.
Yet despite the success, he remains candid about the less glamorous realities of life in the industry, particularly rejection.
‘I always tell people that you only ever hear about the jobs I got, not the hundreds I didn’t,’ he said.
‘You have to be able to take rejection without taking it personally.’
Among his key messages to students were the importance of confidence, preparation and resilience, as well as the all-important rule he learned early in training – never be late.
‘If something starts at 10 and you arrive at 10, you’re late,’ he said.
‘Being early is being on time.’
He also encouraged students not to be afraid of failure.
‘If you don’t know what your passion is yet, do something you’re bad at, and keep going,’ he told them.
‘You’ll get better, and eventually you’ll fall in love with it.’
While having ‘made it’ by most measurable metrics, Barney remains grounded, and is still deeply proud of where he started.
‘Guernsey gave me everything,’ he said.
‘The community, the support, the belief, it all started here.’
