THERE are many reasons theatre fans love Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, but it’s the simple, timeless nature of the story that attracts the latest person in the show’s starring role.

“What you see is what you get and what you get is a really good time,” says Jac Yarrow, who was plucked straight from drama school to follow in the footsteps of Jason Donovan, Philip Schofield and Donny Osmond as Joseph.

“It’s a wholesome tale about a boy overcoming adversity and it encourages you to follow your dreams.

“The message is so uplifting and it’s one of those shows that continues from generation to generation. People are still telling Jason ‘You were my Joseph when I was a kid’ and then I meet kids at the stage door and their mums say ‘This is their first time seeing it’ so I’m their Joseph.

“And it’s such a famous show that it’s kind of ingrained in everybody. It’s a huge part of our theatrical culture in the UK.”

Jac landed the role in the show that’s coming to Woking next month straight from drama school, and it opened at the London Palladium with Donovan playing the Pharaoh.

The Cardiff-born actor says: “I went from being a student living in digs dreaming of being in the West End to suddenly living that dream for real.”

He did have just a little Joseph experience to draw on. “I wasn’t in a school production as such but, when I was around 10, I was in a 30-minute condensed version of Joseph at my Saturday drama school,” he says.

“I did play Joseph himself but I don’t think I had a dreamcoat, just a makeshift little jacket or something. That was my only brush with the show as a kid, although I did see it later when it came to Cardiff.”

The Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber musical version of Joseph is based on the Bible story about a young boy given a multi-coloured coat by his father. His jealous brothers they secretly sell him into slavery, telling their father Jacob that he’s dead.

But Joseph becomes prominent in Egypt as an adviser to the Pharaoh, after interpreting his dreams and saving the country from starvation.

Jac says he’s with Joseph for the long run. “This is the joke we always make,” he adds. “You could do Josephfor ever because you could graduate from Joseph himself to Pharaoh and then you could finally move on to Jacob.”

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat will be at the New Victoria Theatre, Woking, from Tuesday to Saturday 2-6 August.