Mark Benton as Francis, the Director of the play. In July 2012, it was announced that Benton would star as Edna Turnblad in the 2013 UK tour of "Hairspray the Musical", starting in February 2013 and finishing in September 2013. In 2015 Benton appeared as Police Constable Walt Everett in the BBC daytime series "Father Brown", episode 3.12 "The Standing Stones". He also appeared as Les in the "La Couchette", the first episode of the second series of anthology series "Inside No. 9". In 2015, Benton presented the BBC One daytime game show "The Edge" for its first series, being replaced by
The Michael Ball Show special guest of the day. There was often a musical theatre theme to "The Michael Ball Show," with guests such as Sir Cameron Mackintosh, Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber and Kerry Ellis, and performances from the casts of shows including "Wicked", "Billy Elliot" and "Love Never Dies" appearing on the show. Each day, there was new question and the prize fund was determined by Cash for Questions, the viewer competition in which Michael himself takes part in answering questions given by the day's quizmaster. Each question was worth £100, and the amount in the fund after one minute was the prize