Students recreate Marilyn Monroe classic on Worthing stage

The show is Sugar, in the Pavilion Theatre, Worthing, from Thursday, March 14 to Saturday, March 16 (tickets from the venue) – a show which is a musical adapted from the hilarious screen classic Some Like It Hot.

Amelia will be playing the Marilyn Monroe role as Sugar; Elliot will be playing the Tony Curtis role as Joe/Josephine in the celebrated prohibition-era tale of Joe and Jerry – two musicians down on their luck. After witnessing a mob crime, they are forced to flee, and hoping to disguise themselves, they join an all-female band in Florida. There we meet the beautiful band singer Sugar Kane, whose wish is to marry a millionaire. But what happens when Joe falls for Sugar? Will he risk blowing his cover for love?

Amelia said: “When I got the role I was thinking that I should watch the film and I have watched it twice. My parents love the film and dad really, really loves the film. Dad was saying ‘You've just got to watch it! It is just so good!’

“So I did and I think it really helps to get her mannerisms and her characteristics and just to figure out what she was like. She is quite playful. She is quite an innocent character. But she is also possibly a bit naive. She is like your typical blonde. She wants to find a millionaire and just marry him and just to be able to sing with her ukulele. She just wants a simple life but she is just a normal young woman.

“But I'm trying to make my own character as well. I'm basing it on Marilyn Monroe’s characterisation but I'm trying to do something else with it as well. I don't want to just copy her in any way.”

Elliot is taking a similar approach to his character: “He is quite complicated. Jerry is simpler. He is more happy go lucky and just wants to be a musician. Joe follows the same path but he wants to find a sneaky, sleazy way. He is willing to find the back door into situations. I do feel he is a hard worker but he will gladly take an opportunity if it arises. But then he finds Sugar and becomes infatuated with her in a typical Joe fashion. But the journey to get her is through con and through lying which is where some of the facets of the show are perhaps less suited to modern audiences which is why we want to try and find a cabaret style to deliver it.”

Amelia is looking forward to getting on the Pavilion Theatre stage: “I have never been there before and it is a bit scary but it is also amazing. It is a really good opportunity. We have done productions before at the Alexandra Theatre in Bognor but this is bigger. We are practising in the studio space and we're going to have to adapt.”

The performers are third years and, as Elliot, says will be marked on their performance: “We will get an overall grade.

"I think the big aim is to get some real experience of what it is like being in a professional theatre and as lots of people will tell you, no one at an audition will be asking ‘Which class degree did you get?’ but equally it would be lovely to do really well.”

Tickets from the venue.