Heartstopper star Bash Croft on his new move into pop music and fashion

Bash Croft has been oscillating between stage and screen since he was eight. Before the age of 20, the Oxford native had already made his West End debut in Sam Mendes’s production of Oliver!, earned critical acclaim for his role in Trevor Nunn’s King John, and been cast in two juggernaut series: Game of Thrones (as a young Ned Stark) and Heartstopper. But his aims were always elsewhere. “My heroes were all musicians,” he remembers. “David Bowie. Freddie Mercury. George Michael. Elton John. I remember watching Freddie Mercury’s Live Aid performance and just seeing one person hold so many people in the palm of his hand and thinking, ‘I don’t know what that is, but that is what I want to do.’”

Bash Croft attends The Fashion Awards 2025 presented by Pandora at the Royal Albert Hall

Getty

Croft, 24, has written songs since he was young, almost exclusively for himself. Aged 16, he plucked up the courage to perform in front of his school despite being badly bullied. “It was just before I left the school I was at, and there was a boy who I’ve been having a secret relationship with,” he says. “I’d written loads of songs about him, but no one knew they were about him.” Aside from these glimpses, songwriting remained a private pursuit. Then he went through his first big break-up, and everything cracked open. “I used to joke when I was in my first relationship that I would either be with that person forever, or I’d go and write an album about it,” he laughs.

Turns out it was the latter, and Croft’s heartbreak-tinged debut EP The Great Forever is set for release in October. “My ex used to say, ‘It’s going to be a Great Forever being together.’ But I kind of realised that The Great Forever is really that person will forever be my first love,” he says sagely.

For the lead single, Croft turned to another of his idols, Robyn, and her 2010 masterpiece Dancing on My Own. “There’s something about a dance song where it’s like… You’re hurt, but you’re also gonna make damn sure that you’re still dancing, because if you stop you’ll cry,” he says of new song, Pretty People. In recent years, Croft’s idols have switched from the princes of pop to pop girlies — your Chappells, Charlis and Sabrinas — something he references in a running joke about being a “pop girl pending” on socials. “I just think it’s more interesting to shoot for being a pop girl,” he laughs. “I think the fully realised version of what I want to do is being a pop girl.”

He’s taking these idols into his moodboard for 2027, where he hopes to perform even more — he already has BST Hyde Park and a show at The Lower Third under his belt — and “really put on a show”. But he doesn’t mind if it all feels a bit DIY to start. “I want to tread the boards. I want to make mistakes,” he says. “I’m not trying to arrive being like, look, I’m this perfect pop star.” Quite right. After all, Roan wasn’t built in a day.