HAIRSPRAY the musical is right at home on Castle School's stage this week, thanks to its tireless cast of bopping bright young things.

It’s 1962, and teen Tracy Turnblad from Baltimore is larger than life. With a big voice, personality and back-combed barnet she’ll stop at nothing to star on the Corny Collins Show … then snap, her wish comes true.

But Hairspray is about so much more than fixing your hair. This pressure-pot is fit to burst with romantic strife and ideals, high-school battles, inter-generational clashes and Tracy’s quest to smash through racial segregation live on telly.

Castle pupil Georgina Rosser, as Tracy, has an unbelievable voice and should by rights be in the West End within the decade along with Juliette Palpini (Motormouth Maybelle).

Tracy’s mother, Edna (Joe Greenslade) is hilarious and sweet, and between him and the fluffy Penny Pingleton (Millie Wild) they draw the biggest laughs.

Nathan Peeler is the consummate crooner as show star Link Larkin, all Everly Brother suit-and-quiff, while the vicious Von Tussels (the brilliant Nina Backhouse and Eva Sinclair) channel Sarah Palin beautifully.

James Northover, as Seaweed, injected physical theatre single-handedly, while Declan Turner as Corny Collins, show-host himself, couldn’t have better handled that mic.

The only question left is, what the hell’s in that can?

DAISY BLACKLOCK