BEN Elton is revisiting his Rod Stewart musical comedy, Tonight’s The Night, 11 years after its West End premiere for a tour that will visit York in the spring.

“I’ve always loved this show for the same reasons that I’ve always loved the theatre,” says the 54-year-old comic writer, performer, playwright and novelist, who took his first boyhood steps in theatre playing the Artful Dodger in Oliver!

“It’s wonderful to be a part of this community of artists who dedicate themselves to their art and backstage may be rinsing their socks out in the sink or whatever and then go out and make everybody in the audience feel like champions.”

Tonight’s The Night, The Rod Stewart Musical will play the Grand Opera House from April 28 to May 3 with its story of shy Stuart Clutterbuck, a geeky young mechanic from Detroit who lacks the courage to declare his love to the girl of his dreams.

One night, however, he strikes a deal with the Devil, trading his soul for Rod’s, but soon he discovers you can’t find true love by using another man’s moves. Stuart will never be Stewart.

The impetus for this storyline came from the Rod Stewart songbook. “When you listen to Rod’s music and then look at his life, he always seems so fabulously good-humoured, so I thought what would work might be a story that brought to the stage his grace and good humour and something of his devilish side, while also recognising the fact that he sings about heartache as well as anyone ever has.”

Ben spent a week absorbing himself in Rod’s music, “which of course was no hardship at all”, he says.

“As I listened and listened and listened, I tried to identify the overriding spirit of the songs, which were all about love and good times and winning and losing girls and all the things that quite frankly make for good stories.

“So I sat down and tried to think of something that would do justice to Rod’s own gift for storytelling and came up with a story that reminds us of that thing we’re always been told over and over again in drama – ‘to thine own self be true’.”

You might be wondering how a quote from Hamlet applies to Tonight’s The Night, but let Ben explain. “Our show is really about a shy kid in Stuart who wishes that he could be like Rod and gets his chance, only then to discover that only Rod can be like Rod but what Stuart can be is himself,” he says.

“The point is that you’ll do better in life if you try and build on your own strength and personality, rather than being jealous and wishing you were somebody else. That’s to say, nobody but Rod can be Rod just as nobody but you can be you and nobody but me can be me: it’s a simple story, which I think is perfect for a musical.”

Rod Stewart and his management gave their seal of approval. “I first sent a synopsis of the script to Arnold [Stiefel, Stewart’s manager] and fortunately he loved it,” says Ben.

“To this day, I’m not sure whether Rod ever read the synopsis or not. But what happened was that he came to our workshop and turned to me at the end and said, ‘Well, you’ve made me a legend, haven’t you?’ – which was, of course, hilarious because he’s been a legend all along.”

Ben had previously worked with Andrew Lloyd Webber in 2000 on The Beautiful Game, a show about an Irish football team, and with Queen in 2002 on We Will Rock You. After the success of the Queen “jukebox musical”, he sensed Rod Stewart’s songs would transfer equally well to musical theatre.

“Rod writes songs from the heart, like Maggie May, or he will choose to cover exquisite material like The First Cut Is The Deepest, the Cat Stevens song, but they always tell the story of somebody going through some set of emotions, be they pride and joy and heartache or from love to hate or hate to love,” says Ben.

“They’re all about being a guy, really, I guess. They’re guy songs but obviously they appeal to women as well because they’re written with such sensitivity and they come with emotions that concern us all, which are love, pride, hope and the dream that tomorrow will be a better day than today.”

As the Carole King songbook joins the jukebox musical gravy train on Broadway, Ben defends such shows to the hilt. “Jukeboxes are not something to be ashamed of. They’re filled with memories and dreams and love and laughter and they’re good, fun things, and the theatre can be good fun, as well,” he says.

“It’s a perfectly legitimate and honourable thing to seek to entertain the public with music that they love, and the fact that the music is old and the story is new strikes me as no more reprehensible than attaching new music to an old story, as with The Lion King and Billy Elliot.”

Not every singer-songwriter might suit the musical treatment, reckons Ben. “I’m busking here as I say this, but I don’t think Dylan’s music would necessarily work in this way. His music is too eclectic in that you can’t sit down and say, ‘What’s Bob’s vibe’? It’s just too crazy.

“And for my part at least, I’m just not that interested in writing the biography of someone set to their music. I was approached to do that as regards the genius of Tina Turner but what I prefer to do is write an original story embodying the spirit of the artist or the band.”

• For tickets, phone 0844 871 3024 or book online at atgtickets.com/york