Alvin is ready to Boogie

Mar 23 2007 By Diane Parkes, Birmingham Mail

SEVENTIES icon Alvin Stardust is turning the clock back in his new musical Boogie Nights in which he stars alongside former Blue singer Antony Costa and former EastEnder Nick Bailey.

The trio will be taking Birmingham Hippodrome back to the age of scary hair and flares in the seventies musical which tells the tale of teenager Roddy O'Neill and his disco pals.

And this week they visited the theatre to promote the show which plays at the Hippodrome from April 23-28.

Antony, who topped the chart with boy band Blue and camped out in the jungle with I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here, plays Roddy.

Alvin, whose recording career includes hits with My Coo Ca Choo, Red Dress, Pretend and I Feel Like Buddy Holly, plays his dad Eamon.

And Birmingham-born Nick, who trained at the Old Rep Theatre School in the city and played Dr Anthony Trueman in EastEnders for three years, takes the role of DJ Spencer. Alvin, who was last in Birmingham in the summer playing The Childcatcher for a week in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, said: "It is a great show, people are dancing in the aisles before it even begins.

"They love it because they know all the songs. It isn't Shakespeare but it is a great feel-good show."

Featuring songs like YMCA and I Will Survive, Nick, a former pupil at Cherry Orchard Junior School in Handsworth Wood and The Blue Coat School in Harborne, added: "I grew up knowing those songs. Everyone knows them."

For ticket information contact 0870 730 1234 or see the www.birminghamhippodrome.com website.