DEBORAH McAndrew's new adaptation of Cyrano forms the first production of Northern Broadsides' 25th anniversary year, taking in Yorkshire runs in Leeds from tonight, then Scarborough and York.

The Halifax company with the exuberant performance style has joined creative forces with the New Vic Theatre to present Edmond Rostand's swashbuckling tale of unrequited love set in the golden age of musketeers, under the direction of Broadsides' resident director Conrad Nelson.

In Paris, in 1640, the brilliant poet and swordsman Cyrano de Bergerac finds himself deeply in love with his beautiful cousin Roxane. Each day of his life is lived only for her: every poem he writes, every duel he fights. Yet Cyrano is afraid of revealing his true feelings, certain she could never love him in return on account of his prodigious proboscis.

Out go the rhyming couplets of Rostand's 1897 work; in comes a contemporary combination of prose and poetry, wherein McAndrew marries the energy and vibrancy of youth with the romance and classicism of the original.

Christian Edwards leads the company as Cyrano, while Broadsides newcomer Sharon Singh plays Roxane in a cast featuring the likes of Paul Barnhill, Angela Bain, Andy Cryer, Jessica Dyas and Andrew Whitehead.

"Doing Cyrano has been in the Broadsides ether for a while; Conrad has wanted to direct it, and I've always loved the story; it's an unalloyed delight," says Deborah. "I remember Morecambe and Wise larking about with big noses in 1977 with Penelope Keith; then the Steve Martin film, Roxanne, came out in the Eighties, with the changed ending, and there was the wonderful Gerard Depardieu film in 1990. It was ravishing and there's no other word for it.

"For this new adaptation, I've left the setting in France and in the 17th century because you can't improve on that, but Roxane's part is much greater in this version. The play has that Parisian feel; wine and cheese; that appetite for life; it's very sexy, and I don't think modernising it would have helped."

Deborah had a "good look" at Roxane's character in the original work. "My French is a bit rubbish, but I looked at the Alexandrine verse form, which is very constraining and bl**dy long, but I read lots of other versions too, and as far as I know there had been no adaptations by women," she says.

"I've seen a stage version where Roxane is petulant and a bit stupid, where the audience's credibility is stretched by how she's duped for so long, but in the original she's talked about as being an educated and brilliant woman but then doesn't behave that way. So I've looked at reflecting that intelligence, as Cyrano wouldn't have been drawn to her if she was not as clever as him. She deconstructs the language in the letters, and she's seeking a meeting of intellectual minds as much as physical love."

Cyrano run at West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, tonight until Saturday, 7.45pm; Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, April 4 to 8, 7.30pm, except Thursday, 7pm; York Theatre Royal, April 11 to 15, 7.30pm, no performance on Good Friday. Box office: Leeds, 0113 213 7700 or wyp.org.uk; Scarborough, 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com; York, 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk