September 15-23.

It takes a professional to play an amateur, a fact of theatrical life which should be engraved over the door of every amateur theatrical society.

Alan Ayckbourn's wickedly satirical `A Chorus of Disapproval' pokes acerbic fun at amateur theatrical set-ups and, indeed, at the internecine strife which seems to abound in most small-community clubs and societies.

His plot, which traces the on and off-stage intrigues and machinations of a northern English drama group who are staging a production of `The Beggar's Opera', is fraught with more trouble than usual for the amateur: besides acting, there's the musical angle, so besides finding good actors, the director has to come up with people who can also sing.

With the right cast (and it should be borne in mind that even many professionals avoid comedy), `A Chorus of Disapproval' reveals comedy and, indeed, Ayckbourn, at its sophisticated best, laced with marvellously witty one-liners, while revealing an ironic insight into human nature in all its frailty.

Amateurs going through the motions of acting `amateur' is the reviewer's ultimate nightmare: are they really acting/singing that badly or are they just pretending -- or have we suddenly reverted to `reality' mode? There are some excellent individual performances, to be sure -- John Instone and Carol Birch being the two cast members most obviously able to rise to this well-nigh impossible occasion.

Barry Bailey, presumably the selector of the piece, bears responsibility for choosing what is ultimately an inappropriate play for BMDS, and as director, has inevitably bitten off far more than he can chew. A cast of 13 is quite a large number to handle, whatever the play, and requires a somewhat despotic hand.

Auditions, all too often, fail to be the answer to a director's prayers, but some of the cast members who ended up in this production should have given Mr.

Bailey serious pause in his decision to mount the play. Once in, they needed far tighter, structured direction, both in the delivery of lines, body language, and use of the stage area. The fault was not all his. Musical direction by Louise Bradley was also weak, and in spite of one or two naturally good voices, the numbers from John Gay's `The Beggar's Opera' were woefully under-rehearsed, the singing at times, unforgivably flat and out of tune.

John Thomson made a valiant attempt at his role of the `Beggar's Opera' director and dedicated Welshman Daffyd Ap Llewellyn, the strident epitome of the `big fish in a small pond' who, as so often with Ayckbourn's beautifully drawn characters, also illustrates the analogy of a providential `calling' as an obsessive antidote to the grim realities of everyday life.

Steve Dudden was nicely diffident as the newcomer, Guy Jones, who quietly causes havoc with the ladies and the business deals that occupy the minds of his newly acquired thespian colleagues. One of the funniest moments of the evening was his audition for entry into these august ranks, a rendition of `All Through the Night' which Daffyd thinks (and duly demonstrates) should be sung in Welsh.

Lyn Tavares, in one of the central roles, that of Daffyd's wife, seemed as ill at ease at finding herself on a real stage as she was by being cast in her husband's operetta.

Besides the aforementioned John Instone, who brought his customary skill to the role of the rich and eccentric landowner, and a spirited performance from Carol Birch, there was also some fine acting from Thomas Saunders and Helen Coffey as the couple whose sexual peccadillos alert our hero to the possibility that life in the new town may have unsuspected possibilities. An excellently thought-out and crisply delivered performance, too, from Libby Durrant as the wife of the landowner.

The realistic and ever-changing sets which hovered between the rehearsal hall and the members' homes, were designed by Kevin Blee, and Kim Buchanan was repsonsible for some attractive costumes which had to span the wigs and tricones of the 18th century to the jeans and T-shirts of today.

The cast certainly had the audience laughing -- as any play by Ayckbourn will do. Used as we now are to a generally very high standard at Daylesford, however, there was a sense of overall disappointment that this comedy emitted only fractured glimpses of its true sparkle and regret that less than justice has been done to one of Britain's leading contemporary playwrights.

PATRICIA CALNAN THEATRE PLAY REVIEW