HE WON votes (not to mention a judge's heart) on television's Any Dream Will Do, landing the leading role in the musical Joseph and The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, writes Su Carroll. Now Lee Mead is leaving his loincloth behind and has changed direction for the serious business of proper acting.

"I think it was important, although it was not a calculated decision," says Lee. "I finished Joseph last year and I was offered a couple of musicals in the West End but it didn't feel like the right move or the right show.

"So I went to New York and spent three months on a film and theatre course and had an amazing time. We worked on wonderful scripts and spent each day reading books and plays by Shaw, Pinter, Brecht. It was a whole new world and really stretched me as an actor. This play came up and I just thought 'perfect'," says Lee.

"This play" is Oscar Wilde's Lord Arthur Savile's Crime where Lee plays Arthur, a pillar of Victorian society on the verge of marriage to the lovely Sybil when clairvoyant Podgers tells him that he is destined to commit a murder.

Arthur decides that he must protect Sybil by committing a murder before he marries.

The play will also star Gary Wilmot, Kate O'Mara and Derren Nesbitt.

Lee, 28, thinks that his New York experience gave him the confidence to try for straight roles (albeit with a comic edge).

"I've done three months intensive training, but you never really stop learning. I'm working on scripts now. It's been a great experience being cast in this play, I've learned so much and I've had tremendous support.

"I could have gone straight into a second musical but you only get one career and one life. It's important to challenge yourself and I wanted to branch out and stretch myself."

Lee admits that taking part in the public audition process for his Joseph role could have been considered "a short cut" but thinks that the seven or eight years he had already spent in the theatre have stood him in good stead.

"What really helped was my age. I felt more confident because I had that experience behind me. I had worked in the business and knew the ups and downs, and that's a good thing. I had been doing cabaret on a cross-Channel ferry and summer seasons in Yorkshire. My success is down to hard work.

"I would never have thought that I would have the chance to play the lead in an Oscar Wilde play.

"The guy that plays Arthur needs a lot of charm to win over the audience... after all, he is considering murdering someone after he has his palm read by Mr Podgers. It does have some very funny moments.

"I'm very pleased that it is a complete gear change from acting through song where it's just you and your voice."

His new career direction isn't the only exciting change in Lee's life. The judge whose head he turned in Any Dream Will Do, Denise van Outen, is now his wife and they are expecting a daughter in May. He can't hide his excitement.

"We're a normal kind of couple and this is a very special time for us," says Lee. "It's nice to have a career, be married and expecting our first child. It's wonderful. It's worked out really well. The tour ends in Bath and two weeks later the baby's due. It's lovely. Really lovely."

Lord Arthur Savile's Crime is at the Theatre Royal from March 15-20. Box office: 01752 267222.