Thoroughly magic Mandy

She had to contend with a debilitating cold and scenery that would not work.

But Amanda Holden could still count her first night on the West End stage as a triumph.

The actress danced, sang and highkicked her way through the musical Thoroughly Modern Millie despite telling friends that she was exhausted and feeling ill. She was rewarded with a standing ovation.

Miss Holden's appearance in the musical was a gamble. Until now, she has been best known for her protracted marriage problems with estranged husband Les Dennis.

A role in the BBC drama Cutting It proved she could act, but it has taken three months of intensive singing, dancing and voice lessons to ensure that she could make it on the West End stage.

'She is a perfectionist and has been working almost every hour of the day,' said one source close to the 32-year-old actress. 'She is already exhausted and I just hope she can relax a bit now that it has started.'

Certainly, as she flashed some thigh at the show's first preview on Saturday night at the Shaftesbury Theatre, Miss Holden proved that she could cut it as a live performer.

'She was confident, sexy and did not put a single step wrong,' said the Mail's Baz Bamigboye, who was in the audience. 'There were quite a few scenes where she gave a flash of her stockings and that went down very well.

'The only hitch was when some scenery appeared to get stuck and there was a break of about three minutes while that was sorted out.'

The show, based on the 1967 Oscar-winning film starring Julie Andrews, is set in the roaring Twenties. It tells the story of Millie, a young girl from Kansas who goes to New York to work as a secretary to a rich man - hoping to snare him.

Of course, nothing goes to plan. She is arrested for breaking Prohibition by drinking in a speakeasy and falls in love with someone penniless.

Miss Holden's own romantic life is as much of a hit as her performance.

She revealed her love for music entrepreneur Chris Hughes in the Mail's Weekend magazine last week and the couple left the theatre holding hands and kissing.