CHRIS Rawson had a vision in mind when making his pitch to direct York Shakespeare Project's third production, The Comedy Of Errors.

"In my presentation to the executive, I was thinking we would go for a Mediterranean look with white suits and crumpled Panama hats," recalls the deep-voiced actor and director from Wetherby.

Chris did indeed land the directing job, and his production will be set in... a northern Victorian mill town. So much for the Mediterranean, and Syracuse and Ephesus

Explain the change, Chris, for next week's show at the Friargate Theatre.

"It was a gradual thing, thinking about setting it in England, then settling upon northern England" he says. "When I saw Douglas McGrath's Nicholas Nickleby film this year with its bleak Yorkshire school scenes, it made me see the possibilities in setting it in the north with a warring Yorkshire and Lancashire motif."

Chris played Buckingham in York Shakespeare Project's inaugural production of Richard III last autumn. Behind him he has long experience of performing in Harrogate, Scarborough, Bridlington and York (for the Haxby Players and Rowntree Players), as well as directing plays for the Filey Dramatic Society and in Huby near Harrogate. Now he was keen to take a more prominent role within the York project.

"One of the reasons I joined was to get 'hands on' at an early stage. The opportunity to direct The Comedy Of Errors came up and I decided to bid for it," he says. "It could have been any of the plays, but as it happens I have come to love this one."

He is breaking his Shakespeare directorial duck with this production, handling a cast of 25.

"It's a step-change doing Shakespeare," Chris says. "I've directed plenty of plays before: Ayckbourn, comedies, the odd straight play, but this is my first jump into the Shakespeare pool and hopefully not my last."

The look of the production is in the hands of Ali Borthwick, last seen playing the leading man in The Taming Of The Shrew.

"Richard III was rather like Camelot; the 'Shrew' had cross-dressing, so the criteria this time has been to make the women look feminine and glamorous!," she says.

"Having a Victorian setting gives us the chance to move the costumes up a notch and have a different look to the stage after two Elizabethan/Jacobean productions. There'll be red brick everywhere."

The Comedy Of Errors, December 3 to 6, Friargate Theatre, Lower Friargate, York.

Performances: 7.30pm, plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Tickets: £7, concessions £6, on 0845 961 3000.

Updated: 10:30 Friday, November 28, 2003