THE stars of musical epic Blood Brothers just can't stop returning to the show they love.

Your Entertainment talks to two long-running cast members Maureen Nolan, who stars asvMrs Johnstone, and Sean Jones, who plays Mickey.

How did you get involved in Blood Brothers to begin with?

Maureen: "Three of my sisters (Denise, Linda and Bernie) have played the part before me, and so I had just done my first play in 2004 and I got a call to say would I come and audition for Blood Brothers. Linda was leaving the West End to go on tour so I auditioned and got the part! People laugh at me but I said to someone recently that they’ll have to surgically remove me from this part! I absolute love, love the musical and absolutely love Mrs Johnstone so it’s a winning combination in a way. I’ve done other bits throughout the years, I’ve done Footloose and various plays, straight plays and comedies, but I always ended up coming back to Blood Brothers."

Sean: "I’ve been in the show for 16 years on and off and been Mickey for 14. As for the character, it’s basically me but with drug addiction and jail terms thrown in (laughs). It’s very similar to myself, actually, I was expelled from school. When I first saw the show, it was because someone had said to me, you should go and see the show because there’s a part that you’d be right for. And when you’re a young actor you want to know what to market yourself on. So I went to see it, and it’s set in Liverpool which is just down the road (Sean is from north Wales) and I thought, “I get this”. The only downside of it was that it’s a musical and I’m not very musical theatre, I didn’t train to do musical theatre, had never done a day’s dance class in my life."

For those who have never seen the show, sum it up in your own words...

Maureen: "The show is about Mrs Johnstone who has seven children and finds out she’s pregnant again. She can just about affords to keep one more child, but then her husband leaves her and she founds out she’s expecting twins and absolutely cannot keep them both. So she cleans for a posh lady called Mrs Lyons who can’t have children, so Mrs Johnstone gives one of the twins to her and separates them at birth. They never know they’re twins and they meet up every seven years, still without knowing, and become best friends. It’s all about nature and nurture and it’s just fantastic writing by Willy Russell, a genius in my eyes. It’s just an amazing story, that’s the secret of it, and then the great music he wrote as well. I think for guys that hate musicals, it’s a great one for them to see for the first time because it’s more like a play with music, I think."

Sean: "So it’s the story of twin boys separated at birth and one stays with his working class mother while the other one is given away to a rich family, and that’s the story in a nutshell. The characters are growing up in 1960s and 1970s Liverpool and all that pertained to politics and class divide. I suppose it’s an examination of nature versus nurture and how nothing goes right for Mikey, he gets expelled from school, he goes on the dole because of the unemployment situation at the time, while his twin brother who was given away has a great education and goes to university, but fate keeps pulling them together and they become really good friends. But as they get older, the differences between them become more stark."

The Nolans and Blood Brothers have earned a Guinness World Record! How does that feel?

Maureen: "It’s amazing isn’t it, we were thrilled when we found out. And I can’t actually see that ever being broken really, can you? It’s going to be a hard one to beat. We each got a plaque stating the record, and yes, we’re very proud.

Sean: "I’ve had them all! I know them all so well to the point that we became very close and when I worked with Linda, I stayed at her house one weekend in Blackpool for a little family holiday and we called them our showbiz mothers. Bernie was the first one I worked with and I remember her walking around the corner backstage and thinking, “oh my god, it’s a Nolan sister” because they are all so recognisable, and being in awe of her.

Tell me about Sean's portrayal of a child then a grown man during the course of the show

Maureen: Oh it absolutely amazes me and still does, he’s fantastic. He’s so convincing in both parts and then as the tortured man. First of all the devil-may-care young man, despite the fact he hasn’t much going for him, and then the tortured man at the end. I’ve cried every single night."

Sean: "It's the writing! Willy Russell has written the part of a seven-year-old boy perfectly. You have to find the essence of being that age, because the whole thing about the audience is to have them suspend their disbelief because it’s storytelling, it’s make-believe. So in as much as a kid can put on show for you and pretend to be adults, it’s the same with Blood Brothers. I run on stage in a baggy jumper and I sit on the edge of the stage and tell the audience I’m seven-years-old and they’ll accept it. As long as I am giving the right amount of energy then they’ll just go along with it. They get so engrossed in the characters they forget they’re watching adults."

Blood Brothers is at Mayflower Theatre from Tuesday to Saturday.

Tickets: 023 8071 1811 or mayflower.org.uk