ALTHOUGH most famous for her television sitcom roles, actress Belinda Lang also has a long list of theatre roles to her credit.

Her biographical details include a long list of stage appearances showing her as a versatile actress who has tackled everything from The Beggar's Opera to The Merchant of Venice and from Cabaret to Aladdin to the likes of Martha Josie and the Chinese Elvis.

However, despite her success and her admission that she prefers her work on stage to that on television - "I get more variety working on stage," she said - she will always find herself more well known for her roles in successful TV sitcoms.

Viewers will have seen her play Liza in four series of Second Thoughts and Kate in Dear John and she has also taken parts in To Serve Them All My Days, The Midsomer Murders and The Inspector Alleyn Mysteries.

Relatively recently she was on the small screen again playing Christine Hamilton in Justice in Wonderland, a dramatisation of the events surrounding the libel trial involving former MP Neil Hamilton and Mohammed Al Fayed.

However, it was her role as Bill in the five series of 2 Point 4 Children which really made her and her co-star Gary Olsen, as her screen husband Ben, household names.

Viewers enjoyed the normal family's extraordinary adventures centring around Bill and Ben and their catering and plumbing work and increasingly eccentric friends and family.

Sadly, however, the show came to an unhappy end when Gary died from cancer in September last year aged just 43.

Belinda, who said it was a shocking tragedy for everyone involved, has been quoted as mourning the loss of both Gary and Ben, both of whom she would miss very much.

Yet she did say she relished working on what was a top quality show.

"I was very lucky," she said. "It was very well written and it's wonderful to find that quality of writing in a long running series.

"I also think the quality improved rather than ground down as it went on."

She's concentrating on her theatre work at the moment, with no more TV shows in the bag, and is enjoying a national tour with another top class production which comes to Malvern this month.

Life x 3 has been written by French playwright Yasmina Reza and translated by Christopher Hampton who are the same creative paring responsible for the massive international award-winning hit Art. Another comedy, Life x 3 was first seen at the National Theatre last year before it moved on the West End and this year it was nominated for the Olivier Award for Best Play.

Its current tour comes to an end after the week's run at Malvern so it will be a particularly memorable time for the cast.

Belinda plays Sonia, a successful lawyer who is married to Henri, a not quite so successful cosmologist, played by David Haig, DI Grim from The Thin Blue Line.

The doorbell rings and it's a nightmare come true - there, arriving a day early for dinner, is Henri's boss (David Yelland) and his wife (Serena Evans, also of Thin Blue Line fame).

There's nothing in the house to eat except for Cheesy Wotsits and chocolate fingers and the whole evening looks set to be a disaster - but things take a different turn as we see three versions of the night ahead.

"It's really a slice of life seen from three different angles," explained Belinda.

"The mood is quite different in each one and in some ways decided by the behaviour of Sonia and Henri's small child."

Belinda, who lives in London, has been to Malvern before, most recently in Alan Ayckbourn's Things We Do For Love in spring 1999.

David Haig, who is also well remembered for his role in Four Weddings and a Funeral, has appeared in Art in London and New York and came to Malvern last year in Ben Elton's Gasping.

Belinda said: "Life x 3 has been doing extremely well.

"It's very intriguing writing and I think people have enjoyed Art and want to see what else Yasmina Reza has come up with.

"Also Chris Hampton is one of the great writers so it's a very good combination.

"I've been enjoying the tour very much and it'll be quite sad when it finishes."

See Life x 3 at Malvern Theatres from November 13-17.

For details, contact the theatre's box office on 01684 892277.