THE Worst Witch star Georgina Sherrington is touring Britain and Ireland in Chapterhouse Theatre Company’s garden theatre production of Beauty And The Beast.

Tomorrow evening she performs in York for the first time, playing Beauty in Laura Turner’s new interpretation of the classic fairytale.

“I’m incredibly excited to be joining Chapterhouse for their summer tour,” says Georgina. “Beauty And The Beast was one of my favourite stories when I was young and this adaptation is sure to capture all its magic.”

In Turner’s version for “children of all ages”, Louisa, her friends and her trusty companion Milky-White the cow transform an ordinary 1940s’ garden into a magical setting in which to act out the fairytale of Beauty, the Beast and his terrifying castle.

Georgina’s role as Beauty is her first on an English stage since returning to Britain late last year from studying and performing in the United States.

“I’ve been doing a mix off things; I worked for the British Shakespeare Company as a researcher for a little while, and I’ve done a few student things…two London film-school films, which have been a fantastic experience, though it’s been a difficult transition professionally, but now this will be my first theatre performance back in the UK,” says Georgina, who is also a “spokesperson” for Eau Flirt, a spicy perfume with apple top notes being launched soon by Harvey Prince.

The chance to play Beauty came about after Georgina attended a Shakespeare workshop at the Actors Centre in Covent Garden. “I met a wonderful girl there who was working for this company that did amazing tours, and I sent off an email to the company saying why they should employ me, and when I came up for the first day of rehearsals, there was Nicky Diss, the girl from the workshops, so it was fate,” she says.

Georgina had begun her acting career on television in The Worst Witch in 1999 at the age of 12, going in to appear in the college-years follow-up, Weird Sister College, from 2002, before movingto the States to study English Literature with a focus on performance history and Shakespeare at Princeton University, New Jersey.

“I was torn between drama school and university and the most academic of the institutions in America allowed you to both. Luckily I could put my money from The Worst Witch into studying and then had the most fantastic four years. The facilities in the theatre were incredible and the people were amazing,” says Georgina.

“There was a lot of experimenting, which I might not have done over here, although that was all extra-curricular in the afternoons and evenings, as I was mainly studying Shakespeare.”

After graduating in 2008, Georgina spent a year in Los Angeles . “It was a great introduction; I went out there because I wanted to do TV and film but I ended doing Othello for The Charlens Company, playing Desdemona, which was a wonderful experience, with a great director. It ran for six weeks: good preparation for this role.”

Georgina made a pilot TV episode of Dirty Rotten Stories, cast as an English con artist, Lana, but alas it was not shown, and she later took the decision to return to Britain.

Now she is enjoying the chance to act, sing and dance outdoors in a favourite story, newly wrapped in a 1940s setting. “I love magic, maybe from growing up loving magical stories – and it’s a story about someone travelling and moving away from home, which I can relate to, as I did that,” she says.

“The Forties is a lovely era with a lovely tongue: we’re all jolly hockey sticks in the show – and as we’re playing it as a play within a play, where these children decide to put on a production one afternoon, there’s an innocence to it even though it’s a dark story.”

Chapterhouse Theatre Company presents Beauty And The Beast, Museum Gardens, York, tomorrow evening at 6.30pm. Grounds open for picnics from 5.30pm. Bring rugs or low-backed seating; dress in fancy dress to join the fairytale parade in the interval.