JIM Cartwright's tragicomic drama The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice makes for a "home-coming" opening to the Stephen Joseph Theatre's summer season in Scarborough.

"This is a play that's very special to Scarborough audiences after the major hit movie was filmed here in the mid-90s [by York film-maker Mark Herman]," says the SJT's artistic director, Paul Robinson. "Our production is also set here, so we like to think of it as Little Voice coming home."

Cartwright's 1992 musical play tells the story of LV, who spends her days trying to avoid her domineering mother, Mari, and listening to her late father’s record collection, all the while perfecting her singing impressions of Shirley Bassey, Marilyn Monroe and Judy Garland.

When Mari’s latest boyfriend, talent scout Ray Say, hears LV's remarkable voice, he wants to make her famous – and himself rich. "I’m so excited about our LV, Serena Manteghi: I can’t wait to see the looks on our audience’s faces when they hear her sing,” says Paul.

Serena, a former University of York politics and English Literature student, performed for York companies Belt Up Theatre and The Flanagan Collective before playing Bobbie in York Theatre Royal artistic director Damian Cruden's award-winning production of The Railway Children at the King’s Cross Theatre, London, in 2015.

Serena went on to work with Paul Robinson, playing Rosie in last year's London production of Charlotte Keating's My Mother Said I Never Should at St James Theatre. Now he brings her to the East Coast, for her first show there since the 2010 National Student Drama Festival.

"I've wanted to return to Scarborough since walking along the beach in my graduating year and deciding to 'sod my degree and be an actor instead'," says Serena. "I'd always hoped I'd get a chance to come back and walk along the beach again but for that return to be as LV at the Stephen Joseph Theatre was beyond my imagining.

"I was in no way formally trained to do theatre in my university days but I was having such a lovely time with Belt Up, and it was when I came to Scarborough for the student festival that I thought, 'I should really give it a go', so that was a pivotal point for me."

Seven years later she is beside the sea once more. "I absolutely love the film and LV is a role that funnily enough I'd always wanted to play, though I hadn't thought about it since I was young, until during rehearsals for [Belt Up's] Babylon, I was messing around doing impressions of Audrey Hepburn and Julie Andrews, and one of the Belt Up boys said 'you should do LV one day'" says Serena.

York Press:

"LV is such an interesting part when great roles for actresses don't often come around," says Serena Manteghi. Picture: Sam Taylor

"So LV was on my bucket list of parts to play, just as I always wanted to do My Mother Said I Never Should, and when Paul contacted me, I was absolutely biting my nails off with excitement as it's such an interesting part when great roles for actresses don't often come around."

Cartwright has stipulated that song choices can be adapted to each actress who plays LV, and in Serena's case, her ear for a voice has let her add the likes of Billie Holiday, Gracie Fields and Audrey Hepburn to the LV staples of Bassey, Garland, Monroe and Edith Piaf. "There might be a few surprises still to come," she teased at the time of this interview.

At the heart of the play is the troubled, claustrophobic relationship of mother and daughter. "They're a product of each other: Mari acts out because of LV's reticence, and they're just trapped in this cycle, so there isn't a perpetrator and victim as such, and it's only the catalyst of Ray Say that changes everything," says Serena. "His 'discovery' of LV's vocal talent leads them to climb on this rollercoaster to oblivion."

Rehearsals have brought their revelations to Serena. "There's a thread of defiance to LV that I began to discover. You see her trembling, but she's also defiant, standing there refusing to do what Mari says.

"The play's called The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice but by the end LV's free and she's found her own voice as she's unshackled herself."

The SJT's version of Cartwright's best-known work will have Scarborough running through it like a stick of seaside rock. "In our minds, it's very much set in Scarborough," says Serena. "We've talked about where Mr Boo's club might be, where Mari and LV might live; Paul has pointed out a few houses to look at; old terrace houses, one up, one downs, and we'll  be using Scarborough accents.

"The people of Scarborough have such a sense of Little Voice belonging to the town and of it being a Scarborough story. Our landlords have been saying, 'you must go here', 'you must look at that'. and everyone has a story to tell, like telling me 'Ewan McGregor had a cup of tea here' when they were filming."

Welcome back to Scarborough both Serena Manteghi and The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice.

The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice runs in The Round, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, in rep on various dates until August 19. Box office: 01723 370541 or at sjt.uk.com