SEPTEMBER 6 - 11 2004, BATH: Jan Hartley may be happily married but that hasn't stopped her playing the merry widow.

She takes the lead in Lehar's sumptuous operetta The Merry Widow, which comes to the Bath Theatre Royal on Monday September 6.

Jan, 44, said: "I play Hanna. It's a great part and rather racy. The production was very risqu in its day. The composer Franz Lehar was offered five thousand crowns to burn it."

Set in the heady champagne days of Paris in 1912, Hanna has married a wealthy Jew, who drops dead a week after their wedding.

Hanna inherits his fortune and embarks on a dangerous dating game with a former lover, Count Danilo.

She said: "There is lots of bitterness, so the relationship is pretty explosive."

Jans's passion for singing began at the age of 11. Her parents, John and Sheila, asked her to choose between having ballet or singing lessons and she chose the latter.

She said: "My teacher, Mavis, was quite scary but brilliant. She always made me sing very high things like the Queen Of The Night."

Although Jan didn't enjoy studying, she loved taking part in school plays. At 16, she joined the Ambrosian Singers, based in London, which gave her a tremendous grounding of singing classical music.

She went on to star in the West End, taking the lead in a host of popular music, such as West Side Story, The Sound Of Music and Guys And Dolls.

Although Jan takes her job seriously, she still has a sense of humour. She said: "All sorts of funny things happen. We were rehearsing the other day and suddenly a pane of glass smashed. Someone had thrown a tomato at the window. But we carried on singing regardless."

Her busy stage career is matched by an equally hectic family life. Jan is married to James Caroll-Jordan and they have two children, Lacey, 11, and Charlie, eight.

She said: "I never stop singing around the house and must drive everyone crazy. But our children love singing and dancing, so that helps."

Their house in Surrey is also overrun by animals Baldrick the whippet, cockatiels Lil Guy and Phoenix, rats Nosey and Smokey, guinea pigs Custard and Minkey, chicken Clio Throat and cockerel Austin Tatious.

Besides pets, Jan's hobbies include walking and playing badminton. As for future ambitions, she fancies doing more concert work in exotic climes.

She said: "I have been to Vienna and Portugal, which was fantastic. It would also be good to play a really bad woman."

The Merry Widow runs until September 11.

VICTORIA TAGG