OUT Of The Blue, Mary Luckhurst's theatre company from the University of York, makes its debut appearance at York Theatre Royal with the first ever non-professional performance of Caryl Churchill's Far Away.

Five years ago, on Mary's arrival at the university to run a new initiative - BA and MA courses in writing and performance - this lecturer in modern drama set up the theatre company to complement the studies.

"There was a feeling that at drama school, students weren't being given enough help in how to analyse text and character," says Mary, who established the York university course with fellow lecturer Mike Cordner.

Auditions for Far Away were open but nearly all of the 13-strong cast are students on the writing and drama initiative, and their performance will fuse theatre with music by PhD student Paul Abbott and film by English student Nick Morris. "I partly chose this play because of its mixed performance style. It's both naturalistic and surreal," says Mary.

For Out Of The Blue's first Theatre Royal show, Mary had been asked to choose a contemporary piece by an author that would appeal to young audiences. "I figured that most of them would have heard of Caryl Churchill's Top Girls, which is an A-level and GCSE text and is always on modern drama courses at university, and I chose Far Away as this is a surprising play from her," Mary says.

"The play is a visionary warning, an apocalyptic story of conflict and complicity, death camps and ethnic cleansing. Some will think of Bosnia or the Holocaust; others will think of Iraq."

Out Of The Blue presents Far Away in The Studio, York Theatre Royal, Wednesday to Saturday, 7.45pm, plus Saturday matinee, 2.45pm. Box office: 01904 623568.

Updated: 15:31 Thursday, February 03, 2005