Noel Sullivan was written off as a flopstar. But, he tells Alison Jones, his new show proves he is no flash in the pan.

Noel Sullivan sounds remarkably chipper for a man who felt he had been “chucked on the scrap heap” when he was barely into his 20s.

Now, at the grand old age of 28, he is positively tickled by the fact that, together with the ever reliable Bernie Nolan, he is being credited with bringing “gravitas” to the touring production of Flashdance: The Musical, which they are both starring in.

“I am having things written like ‘gave a mature and confident performance’, which is exactly what you want,” he says in his distinctive Cardiff lilt.

Noel’s pleasure in earning the type of plaudits normally reserved for performers with a little more silver in their hair is perhaps permissible, given that he has already experienced a lifetime’s worth of showbusiness highs and lows after being one of the winners of a show that changed the face of television – Popstars.

Noel, together with Danny Foster, Myleene Klass, Kym Marsh and Suzanne Shaw were plucked from obscurity to become Hear’Say, the pop group whose very manufacture became the source of entertainment.

It inspired a flood of series that followed the same Gladiatorial formula of talented (or not) hopefuls being put through a soul-crushing audition process by a jury of bile/platitude spouting professionals before being given the thumbs up or down by the viewers.

However, the group broke up less then two years after releasing their first, record-breaking, single Pure and Simple, and were effectively out of work.

The three girls have scrabbled their way back into the limelight, in the case of Myleene and Suzanne thanks to appearances in reality contests I’m A Celebrity and Dancing on Ice, while mouthy northerner Kym has found her niche on Coronation Street.

Noel, meanwhile, has returned to his first love, musical theatre, appearing in Grease, Fame, Love Shack and What A Feeling.

In Flashdance, which will be at Wolverhampton Grand next week, he plays love interest to welder-with-rhythm Alex who works in a steel mill by day while harbouring dreams of becoming a prima ballerina.

In the film, the part was taken by Michael Nouri, who was in his late 30s. Noel’s relative youth is explained away by the fact that he is playing the nephew of the steel mill’s owner.

“He’s come back from overseas to help save the men’s jobs. He and Alex fall in love but have a bit of a class issue because he is loaded and she is very much an independent woman.”

Though the show retains its thumping 80s sound track (theme tune What A Feeling won an Oscar) there are also 11 original songs written specially for the stage version.

“As the leading man I am pleased to say I don’t have to dance a step,” says Noel. “Which I don’t mind doing but it’s nice to have that break on the show. The dancers are working harder than anybody else.”

Flashdance is not all about high energy dance routines and Cinderella stories, there is also social commentary as it is set against the backdrop of the closure of the steel mills.

“This is the kind of story everybody can relate to,” says Noel. “A lot of us have lived through financial struggle or come from a place you really have to fight to get out of to make something of yourself.

“I come from a working class family in Cardiff. I wasn’t born with a silver spoon. I had to work for everything I have got so yes, I related to it tremendously. Except I have never been a dancer in a steel bar.”

Noel’s path out of Cardiff was through music. He toured extensively as a soloist with the Black Mountain Male Chorus before applying to Popstars. The process of choosing the band took place before the first show was aired. So in spite of the apparent speed of their demise, Noel still feels the group had gone as far as it could under the circumstances.

“Pop bands don’t have a massive shelf life. And because we were first and the exposure was so massive there was nowhere else for it to go. It came to an end at its natural time.

“I’m sure at the time people were saying ‘they could have got another couple of singles out’ but I was definitely ready to stop when it did.”

However, he admits that, for a while, he struggled with the question of what he should do next.

“It was a really dark time as well, obviously. I went from just about to start university/student age to national phenomenon to being chucked on the scrap heap. It was disillusioning and disheartening.

“The best thing I ever did was to get back into musical theatre and back on stage again because, for a little time, I didn’t want to sing. Once I got back to it I realised there was nothing else I could do to that standard.

“Before Hear’Say all I ever did was music, there was nothing else for me to do really.

“There has got to be a line in there somewhere about taking my passion and making it happen,” he laughs, quoting the lyric from the Flashdance song like a pro.

What he found hardest to deal with was the negative publicity the band and its break up attracted.

“Fame is a funny old coat,” he reflects, sagely. “ It is not something I want to wear all the time. If it comes from my job then fine but it is not something I actively pursue. I like my privacy

“If the right project came up and thrust me back in the limelight it would be different now because I would have the coping mechanisms to deal with it. What 19-year-old has the coping mechanisms for that kind of experience?

“Now people are looked after, if you go into Big Brother they help you with psychologists. We weren’t given any protection. It was pure naivety. Nobody knew what was going happen, not the TV company, not the record company.”

“There were certain things that I thought were fair enough but there were others that were nobody’s business but my family’s.

“I lost a brother and sister when I was younger and to see that splashed on the front page when that is the most personal stuff in your life, that hurts.”

Just before joining Flashdance, Noel spent 13 months in America, working in Vegas as the host of Simply Ballroom, putting out a few feelers in Los Angeles and joining the 12 Irish Tenors in Branson Missouri “I had to pretend that a) I was a tenor and b) I was from Ireland.”

He says he relished the anonymity of America.

“It was just what I needed. It was the first time I got to be judged for my talent. To go to auditions and not be the guy from the pop band.”

When he returned he found himself making headlines once more when an article appeared claiming he was out of work and lodging with Myleene.

“Back in the day I would have been really frustrated by reports like that but now I don’t care. I went to stay with her for the weekend to say hello and see the baby and suddenly I am ‘living with her’. What can you say? Who do I phone for that?”

Noel has his own house in Cardiff which he rents out while he is on the road but he admits “home to me is wherever mum is”, which is currently out in Tobago where she went to work as a nurse.

For the moment he is content to live out of a suitcase and says that not even a weekend spent cooing over Myleene’s baby daughter, Ava, was enough to make him consider settling down to raise a family.

“I’m a little bit too selfish for kids at the moment. I still have too much ambition.

“It is also really difficult to be in relationship when you are on tour.

“It is different for guys because we don’t have that biological clock. I am happy being Uncle Noel.

“I still play with a band, a big funk band, and I’d love to do some more TV work.

“I have got a feeling variety is going to come back and I would love to be an all singing, all dancing host.”

* Flashdance: The Musical will; be on at Wolverhampton Grand from August 11 until August 16. For box office ring 01902 42 92 12.