IT'S fair to say that I'm not a big fan of musicals. This isn't borne out of cultural snobbery, but rather painful personal experience.

You see, like many youngsters, I harboured dreams of becoming an actor and after a minor (but well received) performance in a school production of Hamlet, I graduated to playing one of the guys in Guys and Dolls.

The first night went like clockwork and the assembled cast received a standing ovation from the room full of beaming parents. But if that was my acting zenith, the following evening's performance proved to be my Waterloo, as I fluffed my lines and got all the dance moves wrong.

Not only did this bring my amateur acting career to an early close, it seems to have permanently coloured my opinion of musicals. I can appreciate their bonhomie and choreographed skill, I just don't want to go and watch one.

But, it seems, I'm in a minority, because most people can't get enough of them. The likes of West Side Story, My Fair Lady and The Sound of Music, have become familiar to generations of theatre-goers since they were first staged in the '50s and remain hugely popular today. During the 1980s, audiences flocked to the theatre in their droves, not to watch the latest Harold Pinter play, but to see Les Misérables and Miss Saigon. You couldn't move for musicals and the man behind many of them was Andrew Lloyd Webber, who produced a string of box office hits including, Cats, Starlight Express and the phenomenally popular Phantom of the Opera.

A quick glance at today's theatre listings tells you that musicals are as popular as ever. The Grand Theatre in Leeds is showing Evita, Disney's Beauty and the Beast,Cabaret and Oliver! over the next few months, while Bradford's Alhambra Theatre is following Our House, an award-winning show based around the songs of Madness, with the ever-popular Fiddler on the Roof.

Simon Piasecki, senior lecturer in performance studies at Leeds Metropolitan University, says it's all about old-fashioned entertainment.

"I think musicals have something universal in their appeal and quite often it has to do with the human spirit overcoming conflict, whether it's Miss Saigon or Les Miserables," he says.

"It's easy to be sceptical about the endless runs some of these shows have, but they're only running because the demand is there and even though they have been around for years they've stayed in fashion."

The recent musical trend has been to base shows around the songs of pop groups like Abba, Queen and Madness.

"You only have to look at the film Mamma Mia! to see how popular it all is. We have a special relationship with musicals which is wrapped up in a sense of nostalgia and escapism."

Despite such popularity there have been some monumentally bad musicals over the years that have sunk faster than the Titanic. The idea of taking Herman Melville's nautical epic Moby Dick and turning it into a musical pastiche littered with double-entendres, never sounded promising and so it proved back in 1992. The production was harpooned by critics, surviving 15 weeks before disappearing beneath the waves.

Even today, when it seems musicals can do no wrong, some simply don't cut the mustard. Earlier this year a new musical version of the American Civil War epic Gone with the Wind, directed by Trevor Nunn, and starring TV talent show discovery Darius Danesh, was mauled by critics, who had a field day adapting Rhett Butler's famous parting shot to Scarlett O'Hara. But despite the odd flop, our appetite for a song and dance show remains undiminished.

"We do seem to love musicals in this country and it's something the TV talent shows have been incredibly clever to tap into, because not only do they unearth new stars but they find a new audience," says Simon.

Some critics argue that theatres are playing it safe by putting on a musical, rather than taking a chance on a new play.

"It can be frustrating," says Simon, "but at the same time, if you put on a good musical then you can guarantee people will buy tickets."

Musicals are formulaic, but from a theatre's point of view it's a winning formula, and while an artistic director might want to produce work by Chekhov or David Mamet, it comes down to getting bums on seats and nothing does that quite like a musical.