ON YESTERDAY’S EPISODE of This Morning with Philip Schofield and Holly Willoughby, the two presenters met a young man named Wesley Byrne who hopes to have a career as an Ed Sheeran impersonator.
Wesley told Philip and Holly that the attention he receives intensifies when Ed Sheeran has a new song or album out. It has even gotten him in trouble at work, where he’s been told by management to stop taking selfies with customers.
Phil asked if kids who see Wesley working in Asda think that Ed is out stacking shelves in his “other job”. Wesley replied:
Some of the smaller kids… I don’t have the heart to tell them otherwise. I just go “Yeah, music didn’t work out.”
Wesley said he feels too guilty to sign autographs while pretending to be Ed and Phillip told a story about one of his friends who’s apparently a dead ringer for Patrick Swayze, who signed an autograph at a restaurant at Manchester, which is still on the wall to this day because the management refused to believe that this guy wasn’t Patrick Swayze.
Wesley has managed to cash in, however. Restaurants have given him free drinks for taking photos with their menus.
Wesley says he has definitely thought of taking it further than free drinks, by earning money as an Ed Sheeran impersonator, but he has no idea how to do so. Philip pointed out that there’d undoubtedly be a talent agent tuned in, who’d definitely be interested in helping him pursue this. Maybe there’d even be someone from Ed Sheeran’s team who could bring the two men together.
Wesley and his mam are heading to an Ed Sheeran concert in Etihad this summer and they’re already bracing themselves for how people will react to Wesley while he’s queuing.
After hearing that, Philip urged anyone who knew Ed Sheeran to help Wesley get into the concert discreetly for his own safety.
Byrne also said that he went to Comic Con as Ed Sheeran and was stopped 52 times by people remarking on the similarities between the two men.
