Gina is a super trouper in Abba-based hit show

More than 30 years after Gina Shmukler had her first taste of showbiz in the musical Annie, at the age of six, her starring turn in Mamma Mia! confirms her status as one of the country's leading musical-theatre performers.

Based on the music of 1970s supergroup Abba, this feel-good show, about a single mom's quest for happiness and her daughter's search for her father on the eve of her wedding, opened at the Montecasino Teatro yesterday, following a Cape Town run that drove audiences wild.

The lights always seem to find Shmukler. She was cherry-picked to sing I Know Him So Well with Elaine Paige at the Sun City Superbowl in 1999, who told her: "You know you're not a backing vocalist, don't you?"

Her words were to prove prescient when almost a decade later, after returning from a seven-year working stint in the US to marry Paul Choritz , Shmukler clinched a starring role in the local production of Chess, belting out the very same number. Her performance earned her a Naledi Award and a Fleur du Cap nomination.

At her Mamma Mia! audition, Shmukler insisted on tackling The Winner Takes It All before any other number. Clearly, she got it right, as a gruelling three hours later - the directors were intent on recruiting South Africa's finest talent - she was cast as Donna, the character played by Meryl Streep in the 2008 movie.

Though she's no Abba fanatic, Shmukler does not view Mamma Mia! as a lightweight project. She loves doing cerebral work, and Donna's journey is actually quite dark, she observes. "It helps when the director is intuitive enough to give you permission to not treat it as a superficial, breezy role. It's not just bubblegum; it's a real, real journey."

Kate Normington and Ilse Klink, who play Donna's best friends and members of their ad-hoc "Dynamos" singing trio, are "a gift to work with", she says - and their show-stopping Dancing Queen number is a blast. "Even though our knees and ankles have taken strain from the platform shoes, we feel fabulous in them," she quips. A drama graduate from the University of the Witwatersrand, Shmukler scooped accolades for shows such as Blues Brothers, West Side Story, Hair, Grease and Love, Crime, and Johannesburg.

"I was very goal-driven in my 20s," the writer, actor and director says. "(Theatre producer) Mannie Manim told me, 'Be sure what you want' - and I wanted to see whether I could work there or not."

Although the first six months in the gladiatorial arena of New York showbiz was "hell", she soon found her feet. The Jewish lass ironically played the role of Nazi prostitute Fraulein Kost in American Beauty director Sam Mendes' revival of Cabaret.

Tutored by three singing teachers in the US, Shmukler learned that in such a competitive industry, the ace up her sleeve was that she was "an actress who could sing" and that "I had to invest in colour and texture, and tell stories through my voice."

"This guy came up to me and said he'd seen Mamma Mia! 14 times all over the world, and that this was the best production he'd seen," says Shmukler. "I think the show truly has all the ingredients and offers a fantastic live theatre experience ... that goes beyond Abba."