THE students from The Pauline Quirke Academy of Performing Arts in Swindon dazzled their family and friends with a sell-out performance of The Lazy Ace.

As part of The Pauline Quirke Academy of Performing Arts (PQA) curriculum, the students have the opportunity to perform at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London, and get to experience the thrill and buzz of performing on a West End Stage. This saw them stage a performance of PQA favourite The Lazy Ace.

The show is a musical comedy set on the glitzy, glamorous Las Vegas Strip in the 1950s. Detective Chip Buddy is in search of a card shark known as The Lazy Ace amongst the hustle and bustle of the casino scene. Putting the show together the team had the freedom to be as imaginative and creative with their parts of the show as they liked, from the casting, staging and choreography.

Dee Thompson, Principal of PQA Swindon said “The students should be so proud of all their hard work leading up to the show. Their professionalism, their confidence on stage and how their lines were delivered to perfection resembles the highest West End Stage performer.

"Above all the students had fun and absolutely loved performing to a sell-out crowd.”

With another six performances of The Lazy Ace scheduled for this year, PQA students are expected to take the West End by storm.

PQA is a weekend performing arts academy providing tuition for children and young people from 4-18 years. Students spend three hours with the academy rotating through hour-long sessions in comedy and drama, musical theatre and film and television.

PQA was started by actress Pauline Quirke and her producer husband Steve Sheen in 2007 with an Academy in their local town Beaconsfield. This proved to be a very successful venture and led to further openings over the years now totalling over 160 academies nationwide.