Has the man lost his touch?Lloyd Webber has never been fashionable Attitudes towards his work are often tinged with snobbery. His unmemorable collaboration with Ben Elton in 2000, The Beautiful Game, about sectarian divisions in Northern Ireland overcome through football (complete with on-stage knee-capping), was widely judged a failed attempt to attract younger people to old-fashioned musical theatre, and did desultory business for only 12 months. By contrast Cats, the longest running musical ever, played for 21 years, until 2002.In fact Lloyd Webber has not had a real hit for more than a decade, since 1993’s Sunset Boulevard. Despite the top-notch cast led by Maria Friedman and Michael Crawford, the experienced direction from Trevor Nunn and innovative design by William Dudley, the £3.75m show simply does not appear to sing “A terrible disappointment,” sighed the Telegraph; “.. clunky rhymes and .. weak characterisation,” judged The Times, awarding the show two stars out of five. “A show so old-fashioned,” opined the London Evening Standard, “it deserves to be stuffed and displayed in a museum for deceased musicals.”
And with notices like that, deceased it may shortly be. Well-placed pundits give The Woman in White perhaps a year in the West End, maybe less – which, by the standards set during Lord Lloyd-Webber’s creative prime, rates as a decided and very costly flop.

This week’s first night reviews for Lord Lloyd-Webber’s new musical The Woman in White, an adaptation of the Wilkie Collins thriller (itself hugely popular in its day) are almost without exception downbeat and disheartening. We stated our position and didn’t make ourselves popular in doing so.” He points out that the company operated in homelands, where races could mix, though fails to mention that resorts like Sun City were whites only.He has no regrets about moving to South Africa – “for me, it was a good decision” – but as he edges towards the final years of his career, the UK is calling once again.If it pays off, it will be a fine way to sign off. Taken collectively, they do not make happy reading. Bacon’s homeland could end up being the non-gambler’s biggest gamble yet.BIOGRAPHYBorn: 22 July 1946.Education: diploma in hotelkeeping and catering, Stanford Executive Programme, Stanford University.Career:1966: lecturer, Malta College of Arts, Science & Technology.1968: personnel manager, Forte.1973: group personnel manager, group operations manager and then managing director at Southern Sun, the precursor to Sun International.1984: managing director of Sun International subsidiary Royale Resorts.1994 to now: chief executive, Sun International.. But, for all the careful planning and steady approach, nothing is guaranteed – particularly with so many other overseas operators also eyeing up the UK. He doesn’t gamble but relishes his Cape Town home and the simple things in life: walks on the beach, yachting, the odd game of tennis, all those daughters.He talks proudly about the changes South Africa has undergone – “it truly is a rainbow nation now” – but chooses his words with a diplomat’s care when discussing the previous regime “We were a company that was very much opposed to apartheid. Margins are lower on tables, so the more one-armed bandits, the better the return.

The Government is expected to back a limit of 1,250, which Bacon is happy with.The other issue is tax. The sector currently pays 40 per cent, which most agree is too high to make UK expansion pay. It is hoped it will be brought down to the bookmakers’ rate of 15 per cent, but the final decision is up to the Treasury.In the meantime, Bacon is getting on with laying the groundwork and enjoying the South African lifestyle he decided to check out 30 years ago. Bacon wants to open up to five large-scale leisure and gambling complexes, and areas of interest are Sheffield, Glasgow, Newcastle, Birmingham and Leeds, among others.Issues remain, however First is the cap on machines. Kerzner took control of the international arm (now called Kerzner International and listed in New York) while Bacon moved into the now-vacant top slot in South Africa.This time round, extensive planning has been done, with a team in place in the UK for nearly two years now – even though the Gambling Bill is unlikely to become law for another two years. The last time Sun International ventured aboard, it failed to go as expected and eventually led to the splitting of the business. It’s anything but glitz and glamour.”The group, with 21 casinos in South Africa, is now looking overseas for growth.

Then, with the collapse of apartheid and the installation of a new government, the homelands were drawn back into the country and the gambling laws were overhauled. It was now legal, but the new rules dictated that operators had to start again from scratch with their licences.For Sun International, this was something of a disaster. “It meant the development of a new strategy,” explains Bacon, “to comply with the new legislation, and that involved quite a significant downsizing.” The estate was slashed from 17 resorts to just seven “We sold, we closed, it was quite a painful process. But we had to do it and we got though it.”The company re-applied for licences but it was a tough time “We were accused of having it too good for too long. A company that had been built up in a short period was now faced with the daunting risk of closing down casinos and re-applying It was difficult to get the mindset right. The focus had to be on the future rather than the past or present.”Since then, the company has regrouped, with a bigger focus on family-oriented leisure complexes, all a world away from the brash reputation of the 1980s Sun City. And even that has since been brought into the family-friendly fold.”The popular perception is far from the reality,” says Bacon of Sun City “It’s an active resort with a wide range of facilities.