"Mack and Mabel" was first produced in England in 1981 at the Nottingham Playhouse. The production starred Denis Quilley as Mack and Imelda Staunton as Mabel; it had a successful run but failed to transfer to the West End. Soon afterward, British ice-skating team Torvill and Dean, who were based in Nottingham, searched the music library at the local radio station for suitable material for their routines and discovered a recording of the original cast album. When they won the gold medal for ice dance in the World Figure Skating Championships in 1982, they performed to the Mack & Mabel overture. Later the routine was broadcast by BBC Television during the 1984 Olympics, with the British public demand so great that the album was re-released in the UK, where it reached #6 on the charts.