Claudia Shear has had many jobs, including answering the phone in a whorehouse, so she's not about to let fame go to her head, she tells Steve Pratt.

AMERICAN writer and performer Claudia Shear has won plaudits and applause for the play in which she appears as blonde bombshell and sex icon Mae West.

She's always felt it extremely presumptuous to compare herself with the screen legend, but that doesn't prevent her admitting to some similarities. "She was from Brooklyn, and not particularly tall and thin and glamorous. But she made it in a way that I never will. She was an icon," says Shear, who leads the British debut of the five-times Tony Award-nominated Dirty Blonde at West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds.

What they do share is a determination to succeed and a disregard for the rules. Shear was first approached by director James Lapine six years ago about doing a play about West. After workshops, script drafts and an initial production on the fringe, Dirty Blonde opened on Broadway in 2000 and later toured the US. Shear brings the show to this country, to Leeds but not London, after the Playhouse's departing artistic director Jude Kelly "talked me into it".

She calls herself an obsessive researcher, devoting a year to exploring West's life and work. "Research is the ultimate treat because you get to read and it feels like you're working. With West, everything about her interests me. It was just a pleasure," says Shear.

Some facts she knew, others came as a surprise, including West starting in vaudeville at the age of eight and going to jail for ten days later in her career.

"I knew what was going on but not the extent of her life, like the imprisonment and writing so much of her own stuff, and how she reinvented herself until she found the thing that worked," explains Shear. What she wanted to avoid was a straightforward bio-pic. "That's something that I personally don't care for," she says. "I can't bear those shows where she's in a dressing room, a dress strap breaks and she looks back over her life."

The play interweaves two stories, the ordinary lives of two fans and West's rise from vaudeville performer to movie star, and her lonely later years.

She realised that a lot of young people don't know who West was. She'd go around New York city and go up to people, say the words "Mae West" and see their reaction. In a coffee shop, she heard someone ask if they wanted a Mae West or an old-fashioned. As well as lending her name to a life jacket, it seems West is also remembered in a type of doughnut - a long, twirly one that's harder than others and ideal for dunking in coffee.

At the end of it all, Shear felt a profound affection for West. Not just because Dirty Blonde has given her a degree of success, but because she finds her inspiring. The play won Shear a Tony best actress nomination, but she keeps a clear head about success. She knows that the episode of TV's Friends in which she appeared was watched by many more people than will ever see Dirty Blonde.

The Broadway play she did after that flopped badly ("it died like a dog"). She's had rough times before, since leaving home when she was "very young" and attempting to enter the business without going to drama school. Along the way, her jobs included answering the telephone in a whorehouse, which has become the inspiration for her film screenplay Five Very Pretty Girls. So she takes Dirty Blonde's success with a pinch of salt.

"I was really famous for one minute," she says. "Because I'd seen a lot of the world, I didn't believe the hype. I'm just thrilled I don't have to do the proof-reading job any more.

"I still live a very weird life. I don't think fame changes people. Fame and success concentrate your essence. If there are moments when I'm obnoxious and diva-like, you can bet I was like that before. That's why I got fired so much."

* Dirty Blonde continues at West Yorkshire Playhouse until August 3. Tickets 0113 213 7700.