THIS stage version of the '80s hit movie, receiving its world premiere performances here in Plymouth, isn't going to win any Nobel prizes for literature. Books for musicals never do. But it serves the music, and that's what's important.

In Pittsburgh USA, Alex surprisingly works as a welder in a failing steel factory. But she really comes alive at night when she becomes a flashdancer, desperate to gain a place at the prestigious Shipley Dance Academy. Naturally there must be romantic complications, with Nick, nephew of the mill's owner. Inevitably things don't go smoothly for them, but of course they end up together. And she, surprise surprise, is accepted at the Dance Academy. It all revolves around the age-old and somewhat overworked theme of holding on to your dreams and love in the face of adversity. As the song has it, “take your passion and make it happen”.

The film has acquired cult status, not least because of the score, which really is a cut above the norm. All its hit numbers are here, but some new songs have been seamlessly slotted in. And Arlene Phillips has devised some of the best choreography we've seen in a long time – flashy, energetic, and performed breathtakingly by the ensemble. Even the scene changes, effected smoothly by sliding screens so that locations appear and disappear, become part of the action.

Victoria Hamilton-Barritt in the role of Alex is undoubtedly a star, fully justifying Arlene Phillips' faith in her. Noel Sullivan provides gravitas as Nick, as does Bernie Nolan as Alex's mother Hannah, and Bruno Langley is the loser Jimmy who provides the irrelevant and insufficiently integrated sub plot.

Ignore the story. Revel in the loud, exuberant, colourful, slick production and performances, the music and the dancing, and leave the theatre with a feelgood fizz.

This one is surely headed for popular and critical success.