Husband and wife team Paul Shelley and Paula Stockbridge are appearing as a couple in Noel Coward's Private Lives. Steve Pratt discovers what it's like to star with your spouse

Romance developed on cue when Paul Shelley and Paula Stockbridge toured in the stage production of Les Liaisons Dangereuses. The pair became closer during nine months on the road after finding they shared a common passion for snooker.

"Our relationship developed over the snooker table, says Shelley. "We were the only two members of the company who played snooker. And what else were we going to do in the afternoons?"

Their interest in snooker developed before they met. Stockbridge had an ex-boyfriend with a snooker table in his mother's house, where they spent weekends, and Shelley's interest came through playing the game with his sons by his first marriage.

They've brought their cues with them to York, where they're rehearsing at York Theatre Royal, and will be heading down to the nearest snooker hall once the production has opened.

The couple, who married in 1999, are appearing together on the stage for the first time since meeting on Les Liaisons in 1991. They're playing a divorced couple who can't live with each other and can't live without each other, namely Elyot and Amanda in Noel Coward's classic 1930s comedy Private Lives.

Shelley was cast by director Damien Cruden first. "He was looking for his Amanda and asked me if I had any ideas - none of them were Paula," recalls Shelley.

"Age-wise in the play, it's madness as I'm far too old. That's because the originals were Noel Coward and Gertrude Lawrence. No one would ever dare ask how old Gertie was, but he was 30. So was Olivier, who also appeared. They were boys. At the time, 30 was a man in his prime, although now it's young.

"Once I was cast as Elyot, Damien said it didn't matter about ages. He asked if I would like him to meet Paula for the part. He met her among other Amandas. It would be invidious for me to say, but she read better than any of the others."

Stockbridge admits the director was initially wary about casting a husband and wife as the warring couple in Private Lives. "Maybe there was a sense of being threatened, of us ganging up on him. He said, 'no working on your own away from rehearsals'," she says.

"Which we found quite refreshing," Shelley continues. "We did help each other with lines, we had the advantage of doing lines together. We know where the other is coming from, but don't discuss the things at home that should be discussed at rehearsals."

They'd worried about the effect their stage relationship might have on their real life relationship. He says they expected problems, but working together, she adds, "is wonderful, actually".

Cruden too seems happy with the way things are going. "I think he thought all the advantages of us knowing each other inside out, which Elyot and Amanda do, outweighed everything else because it's a very short rehearsal period for the actors to get to know each other. Elyot and Amanda were married for three years and are soul mates," says Stockbridge.

"They're also very physical with each other and fight with each other," says Shelley. "When you know each other very well, there's an easy trust, although it does happen between actors who don't know each other as well."

Both are looking forward to appearing in their first Coward play. Stockbridge says that Amanda fits her like a glove and, like Elyot, is great fun to play. "Coward clearly wrote for them to have a good time, to show off what they could do - playing piano, singing, dancing, and being wicked," she says.

Shelley adds: "When you talk about this play, it does make it sound as if it's a jolly superficial comedy. But it's about love and hate, how they're the right people together but make life hell for each other."

The couple is at pains to point out that Elyot and Amanda's relationship isn't anything like Paul and Paula's. "We don't have a marriage like theirs at all. It's just not like that," says Shelley.

He has an extra reason to be pleased to be at the York theatre - all his family come from the city. He's the exception as he was born, and grew up, in Leeds.

"It's extraordinary for me to be in York because I've been doing my family tree," he says. "I've been to see the church where my parents were married, St George's, and St Wilfred's, where my grandparents married. There's a great history there. I lived in Leeds when I was a child and went to Scarborough for my summer holidays.

"It's just wonderful to be here after many years in the business and not working in York. I went to RADA to train and no one thinks of me as a Yorkshire lad."

* Private Lives: York Theatre Royal from Saturday to November 8.

Tickets (01904) 623568.