They're together at home and on the stage. Charles Hutchinson talks to a couple who are appearing in a Cowardly role.

HE thought he would be too old, she thought she would not be old enough. Nevertheless, real-life husband and wife Paul Shelley and Paula Stockbridge find themselves playing sparring partners and incorrigible lovers Elyot Chase and Amanda Prynne in Private Lives from tomorrow at York Theatre Royal.

Paula, hair newly cut from shoulder length to neck line, recalls the couple's passage to these juiciest of Noel Coward roles, originally written by the Master for himself and Gertrude Lawrence to perform in 1930 when Coward was 31.

"I was in Frankfurt doing Alan Ayckbourn's Things We Do For Love at the English Theatre when Paul was offered the part of Elyot," she says. "His first reaction was 'Oh, I think I'm a bit too old for this' but Damian artistic director Damian Cruden said: 'Absolutely not, it is my vision of the play'.

"I think Paul had in mind that Amanda would be older than I am but Damian wanted gradual steps down in age for the four main characters and I fitted into the age bracket he wanted for Amanda."

Paul - younger brother of celebrated York actor Francis Matthews, by the way - may be biased but he believes Paula's audition wholly warranted her casting.

"Paula was one of maybe nine or ten people Damian auditioned for Amanda, and though I think he was at first worried about having a married couple in such a small cast, he felt it was the right casting decision," he says.

"It's difficult to explain about how rehearsal rooms operate, but rehearsals are about solving problems, and if you live together and work together, it's possible you might try to solve them at home. The rest of the cast would miss out on resolving a problem, and so Damian set the rule that we were not to sort out any problems at home, only learn our lines."

"And we have stuck to that," says Paula. "What swayed him in choosing us is that Elyot and Amanda had been married for three years five years ago, so they have a lot of history and physicality between them. Damian thought that casting a married couple could be useful in those circumstances, because then you can have the contrast between two people who are clearly meant to be together, Elyot and Amanda, and those they have newly wed and are just getting used to being with on their honeymoon."

Paula praises Damian for his casting: "I have to say it is a tribute to him that he took us on rather than seeing a married couple as a potential threat, which other directors may well have done."

Paul adds, with a playful smile: "Damian realised it was pointless sticking in someone new opposite me, and Paula did give a truly good reading at the audition, so I didn't have to do any pleading."

So far, so good, Paul and Paula have left all the arguing to Elyot and Amanda. "In rehearsal, we've made most of the big decisions now, and there really isn't anything to fall out over," says Paula, who met Paul when both were cast for the Royal Shakespeare Company's tour of Les Liaisons Dangereuses in 1991.

Content in their own liaison amoreuse, they would be delighted to work together again. "It's lovely to be together when we're so often at opposite ends of the country or even working abroad," says Paul.

"It saves on all that travelling about."

Private Lives, York Theatre Royal, until November 8. Tickets: £6.50 to £17; under 25s and students £3.50; ring 01904 623568.

Updated: 09:08 Friday, October 17, 2003