A single man more concerned about being a good dad than looking for love, but finds an unexpected, and incredibly musical, romance anyway.

Lee Mead mulls over the similarities between himself and Caractacus Potts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and says with a smile: “I’m acting this out as a character and it’s a kind of irony really of this role, especially of being a father and being very protective as a parent. Potts is like that as well, although he has two rather than my one, and he’s like me... not really looking for love.”

Mead famously won the BBC Any Dream Will Do talent hunt in 2007 which has earned him a musical career, concert tours and three solo albums. In 2014 he joined BBC1’s hospital drama Casualty as Ben “Lofty” Chiltern, but Mead is taking a break while he stars in Chitty on tour to Newcastle Theatre Royal.

But the focus remains on his love life... or lack of it.

“I’m not under pressure in the love stakes at all. I’ve got a beautiful daughter and a busy career and (finding romance) is not my priority at the moment. The right person will come along as and when. I’ve been single for three years, but it’s by choice. People who know me appreciate that I’m a pretty open guy and all the interest in my private life doesn’t bother me too much. All of us are with someone or wanting to find someone. It’s part of life,” Mead says.

The performer stresses that touring Chitty gives him little time for anything else.

“It’s definitely been a challenge even after 15 years of doing this now and the hardest thing I’ve done in musical theatre. I’ve played some lead roles, but this is certainly the biggest because Potts is pretty much on from the top of the show straight through. It’s physically demanding with things like the Me Ol' Bamboo number having me running and jumping around. I’m not 20 anymore, I’ll be 35 in the summer and I’m finding my whole body just aches after two shows a day. I’m having a cuppa tea and straight off to bed, no more partying after shows with this role,” he says.

Mead was finishing a two-week opening stint in Milton Keynes where he’d also been rehearsing the role and filming sequences for TV adverts and promotion at other theatres.

“It’s been a lot of fun even though I’m exhausted. It’s quite surreal actually because apart from Joseph, which launched my career, I saw Potts as a dream role because I’d watched Chitty with Dick Van Dyke for years. I’d never thought I’d get to play the part,” he says.

He’s aware that pop singers often mime during dance sequences, but admits that singing and dancing is the toughest part of doing eight, and sometimes nine, shows a week. “I’m driving the whole show and leading the company and there’s a big number involving the kids, called Teamwork, where I’m hitting some big notes as well. I don’t think in terms of a musical that I’ll play a role as big as this for the rest of my career. Even when I did Joseph there were large gaps when I wasn’t on-stage and it was never as physically demanding.”

He’s found that the parents and adults who attend the show are still just as moved by what is classified as “a children’s show” because of the cleverness of Ian Fleming’s plot and the songs of the Sherman brothers.

“I went to see the show in Southampton with my daughter Betsy, who is six, with Jason Manford as Potts and I got quite moved myself. It’s quite rare a show tours with a 15-piece orchestra, rather than six or seven with click tracks, and the wonderful sound is really rousing,” Mead says.

Manford revealed to Mead that he’d lost 2st taking the lead and Mead confesses that his costume is soaked in perspiration after each show. “I think I’ve lost almost a stone myself in two weeks, so I’ve been told to up my food and carb intake because I’m losing so much weight.”

I have to ask about the impact on him of singing the tear-jerking Hushabye Mountain. “Talking to the director, James Brining, I’ve realised it’s a clever production because it’s not like the 2002 London Palladium production with Michael Ball – which got great reviews – which was bigger in the sense of the Childcatcher coming down from The Gods and the car flying out over the audience. This one has 3D screens and until you see it you don’t realise you get more of the car travelling through the countryside and the car still flies quite high. James has focused on the relationship between Potts and his children plus Truly and Grandpa. Potts is a very positive guy and just hoping that one day one of his crazy inventions is going to give him security,” he says.

“I’ve had comments already from people in the audience that they’ve been in tears at the end because ultimately life is about family and the people closest to us. You’re rooting for Potts because he’s a single dad and when he meets Truly it’s a lovely moment and it’s my job to get that sense of loneliness across while being a great dad. There’s that tiny moment where he’s missing his wife because she’s passed away. It’s got so much heart that it makes this a really classy production.”

Betsy, the result of Mead’s four-year marriage to Denise van Outen, is likely to be attending a performance of Chitty in Canterbury. “She lives in Kent with her mum and that’s about 40 minutes from the theatre. It will be a nice moment for me because she’s learned the songs already. It’s quite sweet and amazing how quickly that children pick up lyrics. Carrie Fletcher, who plays Truly, has a nephew called Buzz and I think he’s nine months old but is already singing along to the songs. I can’t believe it.”

There’s a 50th anniversary of Chitty the musical approaching and Mead is aware of plans to stage a West End version in 2018. “Yes, of course, I’d love to be in the driving seat for that.”

n Newcastle Theatre Royal, June 1 to June 12. Box Office: 08448-112111 or theatreroyal.co.uk