Calamity Jane - and a mum too! Carrie Hope Fletcher in Brighton

But with Calamity Jane, she has got to be all of those things and more, especially as she is now combining them all with an even bigger off-stage role as a new mum.

The last time Carrie was in the area she was heavily pregnant in the 2023 Crawley pantomime. Her daughter Mabel was born on March 1 2024.

“And then I had my solo tour seven months later in September/October. It was only two and a half weeks. It was a nice little run-up to going into Calamity Jane. Actually I found out during the Crawley panto that I was going to be doing Calamity Jane. I had a long telephone call with (director) Nikolai (Foster) about what his vision was and I knew that my own little tour would come first. Calamity Jane was always going to be now, and so my own tour was a good test for what it was going to be like to be away from Mabel. I cried from the moment I left until the moment I got back… but not on stage! It was tough but we managed in small bite-sized chunks. Luckily my husband is in the business too.”

Almost inevitably Carrie feels that motherhood has changed her: “I do feel that I'm massively different. All the things that I used to stress about and take so seriously just feel like really small and significant now. But I'm not belittling them. But I think it's just that your perspective changes so much and it just shifts so much. It really has been quite a journey for me and my husband.

“But I do feel different on stage now. I think the good thing is I'm starting to take things less seriously. I wouldn't say that I was insecure as a performer before, but I used to beat myself up if anything went wrong even if it was something that the audience would never have known about or noticed. But I would hold onto it for weeks and beat myself up and get a thing about it, almost a complex so I would be thinking about it for the next show. But now that's just the kind of thing that I can let go. And as a result I find myself enjoying it all so much more. I always did enjoy being on stage but that enjoyment just feels so much more elevated now, especially with a show like Calamity Jane.”

Not least because Calamity Jane gets to be so many different things: “She's got an amazing love story but she's also the comedy character. It's all in the name Calamity, calamity as much for other people as it is for her! She's the gun-slingin’ cowgirl she gets all these amazing songs. She gets to be very boyish but she also gets to wear the ballgown.”

Calamity Jane is at the Theatre Royal Brighton from April 1-5 and The Mayflower Theatre, Southampton from June 3-7.

“Calamity Jane is one of these characters who does not think a lot about what she's doing. She just arrives and just continues to be the way she is all the way through. She doesn't think before she acts. She just does whatever it is and then figures out how to cope with if it goes wrong.

“And I think in a way you have to approach the show in that way. You have to go in all guns blazing and full of energy.”

Even when you've had very little sleep: “You've been up almost all night and then you've got to do two shows but that's when you realise how fantastic the other members of the cast are. You're surrounded by brilliant people on stage who are also playing instruments. We've got the orchestra on stage. And you might be thinking that you just haven't got the energy as you start a song but it's wonderful to look around and you see all these incredibly talented people, unbelievably talented people and you are there on stage with them. You look around and you know that you can get through anything because they are there with you and that's what gives you the energy.”