Elaine C Smith lured to Chitty Chitty Bang Bang by Child Catcher role

Elaine C Smith says she was lured back to the stage by the promise of getting to perform as the Child Catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

No stranger to the theatre, Elaine is enjoying the opportunity of performing the role of the sinister character in front of home audiences.

The musical is currently playing in Edinburgh before touring venues across the UK.

Elaine told STV News: “When it came along initially I was like ‘I’m not sure I want to do that’ but when they asked if I would be the Child Catcher that’s when I thought ‘oh, that’s interesting’.

“To play the baddie and a woman playing that part – she’s got to be terrifying.”

Elaine will be in all of the Scottish runs of the production – Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Glasgow and Inverness – and she says she especially enjoys performing to a home crowd.

She said: “When big shows come up and stars are in it, the audience will sit and receive it and go ‘that’s good, that’s good’ but they won’t join in – well maybe in Glasgow they do, they think they’re in it.

“I think having a connection with someone in it helps a wee bit.”

Although she’s one of the biggest panto stars in Scotland, she’s perhaps best known in her former TV role as the wife of Rab C Nesbitt.

But what would Mary Doll thought of her playing as the Child Catcher?

“I think Christine from Two Doors Down, she is the Child Catcher! Mary would be a bit kinder, she was a bit kinder to kids and had kids of her own, whereas Christine takes no prisoners.”