IT is 36 years since a Swindon stage school pupil had the best Christmas present of her life.

In 1979, Susannah Hayward, 13, learned she had the starring role in the West End production of smash hit musical Annie.

We said: “She’s the daughter of Swindon greengrocer John Hayward of Mill Lane, and a pupil at the Tanwood School of Dancing in Bath Road.

“She’s been playing one of the secondary orphan roles in the show since October and living in London in the theatre school.”

Susannah Hayward had been a Tanwood pupil since she was two years old.

Her mum, Barbara, said: “She’s worked so hard, learning the part in her spare time between performances, with an American accent as well. She’s a great little kid.”

Tanwood founder Mollie Tanner was the first person Susannah told of her promotion to the starring role at the Victoria Palace.

Mollie had also taken another young performer, 11-year-old Amber Bezer from Purton, to the audition.

Amber, who won a secondary orphan role, would later find greater fame in various stage, screen and television parts, including an appearance with Peter Ustinov in 1988 Agatha Christie Mystery Appointment with Death. She would also appear in a memorable Levi 501s commercial in 1985, in which a male model called Nick Kamen stripped to his boxer shorts in a laundromat.

In a follow-up story published in 1991, we revealed that Susannah was among a total of 16 Tanwood pupils who had appeared in Annie during the show’s long run.

Susannah herself studied for O-levels after her time in the starring role and then went back into the businesses as Susannah Lee Hayward, as actors’ union Equity already had a Susannah Hayward on its books.

At 16 she was back in the West End in the chorus of Bugsy Malone at the Haymarket, and later appeared in Me and My Girl and Charlie Girl.

Susannah then spent 18 months with the Royal Shakespeare company and appeared in various other productions across the country.

By 1991 she was concentrating on a new role as mother to a baby daughter and lived in London.

We can find no further mentions of her in our archives, although her Imdb page mentions appearances in The Bill, Press Gang and a 1994 BBC programme about the role of women in shaping history.