A former member of Simon Fuller’s BRIT Award-winning pop group S Club 7, Hannah Spearritt has returned to the West End after a substantial break – her first London stage outing was in the National Youth Music Theatre’s 1997 production of Bugsy Malone. That production spent Christmas playing an 11-week run at the Queen’s Theatre and kick-started the careers of castmates including Sheridan Smith, Jamie Bell, James Bourne and Michael Jibson.

Spearritt will also be familiar to fans of ITV’s science fiction drama Primeval, having played zoologist and reptile expert Abby Maitland since 2007 with the programme’s latest series due to air this summer.

Late last year Spearritt took on the role of Lady Frances in Jessica Swale’s acclaimed Southwark Playhouse staging of The Belle’s Stratagem. That production brought Spearritt to the attention of casting directors at the National Theatre and she was recent cast in One Man, Two Guvnors.

Richard Bean’s Whatsonstage.com Award-winning comedy opens at the Theatre Royal Haymarket tomorrow (13 March, previews from 2 March 2012) with a new cast fronted by Owain Arthur, taking over the leading role of Francis Henshall from James Corden, as well as I’d Do Anything winner Jodie Prenger and Spearritt’s Primeval co-star Ben Mansfield.

The production continues at the Haymarket until 15 September 2012 when One Man, Two Guvnors will embark on its second UK tour playing dates in Blackpool, Belfast, Salford, Llandudno, Glasgow, Newcastle, Leicester, Leeds, Nottingham, Norwich and Cardiff.

How did you come to be involved in One Man, Two Guvnors?

I was doing a play at the Southwark Playhouse called The Belle’s Stratagem last year. The casting director for One Man, Two Guvnors came to see the show and it was that which got me the audition. I went along to the National for my first audition, had a recall and taking the role was pretty much a no-brainer for me. I’d seen the show twice before and laughed hysterically from the start to the end.

The Belle’s Stratagem was your first stage role after a considerable gap. Can you tell me about the production?

It was a really great thing. I’d been involved with television for the majority of my career and it was great to get back on stage again. It was great to build something from scratch, the play hadn’t been staged for a very, very long time and working with like-minded people to create something that we all believed in was really good for the soul really. It was a great little venue and I had a great time.

Looking back at your credits your transition from S Club to regular television roles appears to have been pain free?

I wouldn’t say “pain free” but I’ve tried to manipulate it so it seems that way. It’s not just happened. I’ve been careful in terms of what I choose to do and what I don’t choose to do. I think it would have been very easy to take a different route. I think it’s possibly taken longer, but I’ve been very sure of where I want my career to be heading.

For me when I got the call from the National to be seen for One Man, Two Guvnors was a bit of a milestone in my career. It’s where I’ve been aiming for. That was a very good day in my world. Especially with my background, which not dissing it, is completely different from that area of the performing world, it was happy days.

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