It’s Jodie’s final

WHEN I call Jodie Prenger for our interview, I find her in a cafe during a break from the theatre.

She launches into a story about an impromptu shopping trip to a market where she’s just bought herself a trunk and four deckchairs.

But now, sitting thinking about her impulsive purchases, the musical star – touring the country in Willy Russell’s Shirley Valentine – has no idea how to transport them back to the theatre (Chesterfield at the time) never mind back home once the tour’s over.

As she talks, it’s fast and furious and funny – every bit the force of personality that won over viewers on BBC1 talent-seeker show I’d Do Anything which saw her picked to play Nancy in a West End revival of Oliver!

Her winning moment – before the eyes of the watching nation and Andrew Lloyd Webber who oversaw the show – was nine years ago.

And since being propelled into the spotlight, the talented Blackpool-born actress and singer has barely drawn breath.

Jodie had been entertaining for years before that win, and had already appeared on TV – most notably in 2006 in weight loss show The Biggest Loser (which she also won), so she’d done the ground work.

She went on to play the West End role of Nancy for more than a year, writing autobiography It’s a Fine Life at the time, then there followed more musicals and tours, including Spamalot and playing Miss Hannigan in Annie, as well as TV and radio.

Her starring role in Shirley Valentine, which starts a week-long run at Newcastle Theatre Royal on Monday, has won her more fans and some cracking reviews.

As will be well remembered by fans of the 1989 film version starring Pauline Collins, Willy Russell’s play sees a Liverpudlian housewife who jets off to sunny Greece to escape from a life of cooking egg and chips for her husband’s tea, and so bored she talks to the wall.

And Geordie audiences will have the last chance to see her in it.

Come next Saturday, when the play ends its run, 38-year-old Jodie will be packing away Shirley’s suitcase and moving on.

When the play transfers to Dartford for its final week of the tour, it will star Nicky Swift who also took over the role last week.

While Jodie will be sorry to say goodbye to Shirley, she’s excited about an upcoming new role in Kay Mellor’s Fat Friends The Musi-

BARBARA HODGSON CATCHES UP WITH THE STAR OF SHIRLEY VALENTINE WHICH OPENS IN NEWCASTLE TONIGHT