A WORCESTERSHIRE school had a pleasant surprise when a former pupil took a break from London's West End to return to his roots.

Ellis Kerkhoven - who is now in his late 20s - was a pupil at Whittington C of E Primary School in the 1980s and later went on to study at the Guildford School of Music.

From there he has appeared in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat on the West End in London as well as a number of other big theatre productions.

Earlier this week, the talented actor returned to the school to help youngsters at Whittington with their performance of Joseph, due to be aired to parents at the school next week.The visit came about as a teacher at the school was doing some research on the production and realised Ellis had starred in it in London.

Ellis - who now lives in London but whose parents still live in Worcestershire - spent the day at the school on Tuesday, where youngsters performed extracts of the show for him before he sang a couple of tunes with them.

He also spoke to the pupils about why he got into acting and signed autographs for all of the cast.

Headteacher David Holt said: "It went very well and was a fantastic occasion, causing great excitement in the school.

"It was lovely to see him again and see him playing on our stage as he had done in a way before when he was 10 or 11."