The Interview | The top Jersey trial lawyer with a second life in theatre

How does someone spend one day preparing for Jersey's biggest criminal trials and the next directing a musical? That's the balancing act advocate Simon Thomas has mastered.

Simon is a partner at Baker & Partners and one of Jersey's most experienced courtroom lawyers.

Over a career spanning three decades, he's been involved in many of the island's highest profile cases, including the Lacumbe trial last year.

And this autumn, he'll be involved in the trial arising from the Haudemont tragedy.

But away from the courtroom, he has another passion entirely, swapping legal submissions for stage directions.

He's the director of Come From Away, the internationally acclaimed musical based on the extraordinary true story of the thousands of airline passengers stranded in a tiny Canadian town after the 9-11 attacks, and the remarkable community that welcomed them with open arms.

The production is also one of the first major community shows to take to the stage since Jersey Opera House reopened.

Partway through performance week, Simon dropped into the Bailiwick podcast studio to talk about doing justice to real life stories, whether musicals deserve more credit than they're often given, and whether there's any truth in the old cliche that all barristers are failed actors.