IN a fruity York Theatre Royal season with more danger warning signs than the A1 route into Scotland, David Hare's The Blue Room is the adults-only one with the nudity.

Famously premiered by Nicole Kidman in the West End in 1998, Hare's play is freely adapted from Arthur Schnitzler's erotic classic La Ronde, whose first night in Vienna in 1921 prompted the police to close the theatre.

No such furore will accompany the Theatre Royal's production. Nevertheless, there is always a frisson when sex is in the air, and The Blue Room is full of it, with its daisy chain of brief sexual encounters.

In a cast of four completed by Andrina Carroll and James Garnon, Malcolm Skates plays The Playwright, The Cab Driver and The Politician, while Katherine Kelly is The Girl (the prostitute), aged 19, The Model, aged 17 and The Au Pair, 24.

At 43, Skates is an experienced player - before this season he last appeared at the Theatre Royal in Noises Off and Lucky Chance 12 years ago - whereas Barnsley-raised Katherine, 21, is newly fledged from the RADA drama school nest.

Neither has appeared previously in the natural state on stage.

Katherine says: "My feeling is that you come to a point where you're so solid with the character you're playing, and with the scene, that to check out of it and feel 'Oh, Katherine doesn't want to be in this moment' would be wrong.

"If it's the only way to make the audience believe two people have just had sex, then fair enough, you take something off."

Malcolm is more worried about dressing. "It's all right taking something off but when you have to get dressed quickly in a scene, then it becomes very technical," he says. "So we look forward to the revenge of the costume."

That revenge struck him once before. "When I did La Ronde at drama school it was going really well until my trousers broke and fell down mid-scene. I was only playing one role, this time it's three. Which means three pairs of trousers..."

Malcolm says that self-conscious thoughts about his body must be banished. "In rehearsal you catch yourself thinking 'Is it me up there on stage or am I performing?', and then you think 'Well, nowhere is it mentioned what size or shape the characters are."

Katherine will be appearing in all three main-house repertory plays this autumn - Les Liaisons Dangereuses opens tomorrow - and already she has had another novel experience. Playing Hermia in A Midsummer Night's Dream she must splash about in a large pool.

"It's like a bath. It's warm when you're in it but it's cold as soon as you get out!" says Katherine.

Water sports, nudity; what a start to her professional career she has experienced. "It's been brilliant. When you're at RADA you hear of all these wonderful repertory theatres where you learn so much, and it's true!" she says.

Box office: 01904 623568.