Actor Andrew Wincott is playing an imaginary ideal lover in an Alan Ayckbourn play.
But this is nothing new, as millions of listeners spend a few minutes a day conjuring him up in their minds.
The result is probably far from reality.
He plays gay red-headed farmer Adam Macy in The Archers, while Londoner Andrew has brown hair and a sort-of girlfriend in South America.
Only their voices are the same.
Andrew says: 鈥淯sually I can go about unrecognised, but sometimes there鈥檚 a glimmer of recognition when people hear my voice.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a danger when people meet me, having conjured up what Adam is like in their minds.
鈥淗opefully they are not too disappointed.鈥
In Ayckbourn鈥檚 play Woman In Mind, which opens at Birmingham Rep on Friday, Andrew plays Andy, fantasy husband to Susan (Meg Fraser).
鈥淚t opens with Susan lying on the lawn in her garden, having had a blow to the head,鈥 explains Andrew.
鈥淪he鈥檚 actually married to a vicar but she鈥檚 not happy and is undergoing a breakdown.
鈥淪he retreats into a fantasy world where she鈥檚 married to me.
鈥淲e imagine that Susan has read a lot of romantic novels and watches period dramas, so I鈥檓 kind of modelled on someone like Mr Darcy.
鈥淏ut then the fantasy turns on her, the two worlds collide and she loses control of the fantasy as the play goes on.
鈥淭he last scene is mayhem, a madcap farce which is hilarious at times but also desperately distressing.
鈥淎yckbourn very cleverly keeps the play balanced between light and dark 鈥 he says you can鈥檛 have one without the other.
鈥淥n the one hand it鈥檚 familiar Ayckbourn territory, poking fun at suburban middle class values.
鈥淏ut it also has a dark side, when the audience realises that Susan is dying inside.
鈥淎yckbourn said that an audience can laugh for as long as they want, but they should be pulled up short at the end when they realise what鈥檚 happened to Susan.
鈥淭here are laughs, tragedy and pathos.鈥
Woman In Mind is a joint production with Dundee Rep, where the cast has been rehearsing.
That meant a quick return flight from Scotland to Birmingham when Andrew was needed for a recording of The Archers.
鈥淚 live in London but Birmingham is like a second home to me, I鈥檓 always coming up here to work.
鈥淭he Archers are very good at letting you do other work, but rehearsing in Dundee has presented a certain degree of logistical difficulty.
鈥淚 had to fly back one week, and when we finish in Dundee I will have to pack up and drive through the night to be at work at the Mailbox at 9am.
鈥淎ctually I feel a connection to The Archers because my mother grew up in Sibford Ferris, between Stratford-upon-Avon and Banbury.
鈥淪he went to the same school there as Godfrey Baseley who created The Archers.
鈥淚 imagine Sibford Ferris as being the basis for Ambridge. My mother even grew up on Home Farm.
鈥淭hen again, Ambridge is everyone鈥檚 ideal village.鈥
Andrew first joined The Archers back in 1991, when he played Danish organic agricultural student Thorkhil Jensen, who spent five months at Bridge Farm.
鈥淚 spoke with a Danish accent, and I remember one amazing episode when Jill鈥檚 killer bees escaped and I had to rescue Kylie.鈥
Then in 2003 he returned as Adam Macy, son of Jennifer Aldridge, who had been breeding goats in Kenya.
He was the soap鈥檚 first homosexual character and for a while he was the only gay in the village, until he fell in love with Ian Craig (Stephen Kennedy), the chef at Grey Gables.
They kissed in the strawberry polytunnel in 2004, then 20 months later became the first soap couple to enter into a gay civil partnership.
Both their fathers weren鈥檛 keen but finally relented and turned up for the ceremony.
There were negative posts from fans on Archers message boards, but Andrew says the response has been overwhelmingly positive.
鈥淚 haven鈥檛 had any personal abuse,鈥 he insists. 鈥淚 feel that it鈥檚 been pretty well received 鈥 we are in the 21st century, after all.
鈥淚鈥檝e had the occasional letter from gay listeners saying how delighted they are with Adam and Ian鈥檚 relationship.
鈥淭hey鈥檝e been together 10 years now, which makes them the longest gay relationship in soap, and probably one of the longest relationships full stop!
鈥淲hen they first met, we were talking about where the relationship could go, whether to split them up or carry on. I鈥檓 glad they had the civil partnership.
鈥淲ho knows what the future is for them? It has occurred to me that they could now get married.鈥
When he鈥檚 not on the radio, Andrew 鈥 who has a 21-year-old daughter from a previous relationship 鈥 is trying to conduct a very long-distance romance with a woman who lives in Colombia.
鈥淢y oldest friend lives in Bogota, so I visited South America last year and he introduced me to a beautiful lady.
鈥淭he status of our relationship is difficult, it鈥檚 very hard to sustain it when we鈥檙e so far apart.鈥
* Woman In Mind plays Birmingham Rep from June 13-28. For tickets, ring 0121 236 4455 or go to
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