Dramatic Society is not the lightest of fare.

But for those interested in pondering the multi-shaded areas of morality, justice, the essence of humanity and society building -- "Our Country is Good'' can certainly offer a thought-provoking evening.

Written by Timberlake Westenbaker, who also penned the Oscar- winning Schindler's List, the play is set in Australia at the tail end of the 18th century.

The play opens with the first group of convicts sent to Australia, shipbound, hungry and miserable. The trip to Australia for those accused of crimes such as stealing biscuits in 1788 was no voyage on the Nordic Empress and took over eight months.

The story is based on the true lives of English soldiers and convicts that found themselves an uneasy society in a far flung, foreign land. Much like Schindler's List, the play has numerous characters whose stories are told in a series of intersecting vignettes.

On arrival in Sydney, the convicts ended up performing a play as a morale booster -- George Farquhar's The Recruiting Officer. This twist means a play is being performed within a play the BMDS actors portraying characters who are also acting.

A complicated casting situation for BMDS as the play calls for a much larger cast of actors than the usual fare the group presents at Daylesford and many are called upon to play multiple roles -- convict and jailer, male and female.

This situation makes the first act particularly difficult to follow. Several of BMDS' strongest actors turn out fine performances in multiple roles however. Kelvin Hastings Smith is a Rousseau-spouting Governor and a falsely convicted aspiring writer.

Barbara Jones, John Thompson and Richard Dymont -- well familiar to BMDS fans -- all turn in performances consistent with their past work. And I was happy to see Sondra Choudhury in the cast after adoring her performance in The Hot Mikado last year. Choudhury plays two roles -- an Aborigine struck down with the European imported small pox in the second act and a convict from Madagascar. In fact, no one stood out in this cast for acting poorly. And one is forced to concentrate on the actors given the minimalist sets the company chose to use for the play. The key factor in whether audiences enjoy Our Country is Good will not be the quality of the acting or the set design but whether they enter the theatre prepared to deal with difficult subject matter, occasionally lewd language, and a complicated storyline.

One criticism I would make is that more information about the historical figures portrayed in the play might have been included in the programme and perhaps a synopsis of The Recruiting Officer. That being said, one can get a feeling for the dehumanising experience the convicts lived through as well as how easy it was to fall outside the law in the 18th century.

Don't hesitate to see the play which runs at 8 p.m. nightly until Saturday at the Daylesford Theatre on Dundonald Street but makes sure you working on full-brain capacity when you enter. As they say in the play, theatre is not for those with short attention spans. Tickets are available one hour before curtain for $15.

Tania Theriault THEATRE THR