In the year Cher turns 80, Rachael Hawnt, winner of ITV’s Starstruck, hits the road with her biggest tour yet, The Shoop Shoop Show – The Cher Collection.

Dates along the way include the Kings Theatre, Portsmouth on April 25 (box office: 023 9282 8282)

Hampshire-based Rachael said: “When we were putting the show together, we realised that it coincided with her being 80 and we just thought that's great, a great way to bring it all together. She's not going to be complaining about being 80! She is just fabulous and she looks so fabulous still.”

It's a remarkable career to celebrate: “She has got such longevity for a start. She has been around for a long time. She has earned her place. She has proved to everybody that she's got what it takes and that she has still got the power. And I think that's partly because she is a great collaborator. She has got a brilliant team of people around her who know what to put to her. Obviously she decides in the end what she does, but the fact is that she is able to make great choices.

“She's always been there for me when I was growing up. A lot of the time when I was doing auditions I would end up doing Cher songs throughout my career. They have always stood me in good stead.

“But I ended up doing Starstruck in 2022 and I ended up winning it as Cher. I had never set out to be a tribute act. It wasn't on my radar at all. I got a call asking me if I would audition and I said no. I told them that I knew a lot of really good tribute bands out there and that I wasn't going to do it. But they said they had seen me and just said to do the audition so I did. And I did a dreadful audition. It was really bad but the good thing was that we all laughed. We were just coming out of Covid and everybody needed a laugh at the time! I just thought that would be the end of that and that it would be the last I would hear from them but then they asked me to come back and do another audition in London and they asked if I would do a Cher song. They didn't want people that were tributes already. They wanted people that would learn how to do it, and so I went up to London.”

One thing led to another and she won the series: “You see the look on my face! I looked like I was in a gurning competition! I was just so surprised! I learned the three songs but I went into it all without any preconceived ideas or expectations. I just thought let's go with it and let's see what happens. I had a few months to learn it and I just started trying to talk like her, to get the shape of her mouth and to get the shape of that accent. It was a really strange process and then all of a sudden I just started talking the way she does!”

Now comes biggest tour so far: “I was on the cruise ships for three years as a headliner and I was travelling and doing a lot of corporate work abroad but this is now the first big Cher tour that I have done.”