Jordan Best played Elizabeth Proctor in a 2004 production of The Crucible. Now she's directing the play in a production presented by the Canberra Repertory Society.

"It's such a great story, so beautifully constructed, so beautifully written, and it's such an emotionally gripping story."

The Crucible was first produced in 1953, in the midst of the McCarthy era of anti-Communist investigations and accusations in the United States, and was seen as an allegory of the era's Communist "witch hunts".

Despite this connection and the fact the play is set in a specific place and time - the witch trials in Salem, Massachussetts, in the late 17th century - Best says she has been firm in emphasising it is not a historical play. "It's a story. The fact that it's set in Salem is not the most important thing about it.

"The important thing about it is the story and the characters ... it's a story about the desperate measures people will go to save themselves and to get what they want."

In the play, John Proctor (played by Duncan Ley) is a flawed but essentially decent man, a farmer who had an affair with his former maid, 17-year-old Abigail Williams (Zoe Priest). Although she was dismissed, Proctor's relationship with his wife, Elizabeth, (Lexi Sekuless) is still strained.

However, a bigger problem involving Abigail threatens the whole town. She is the niece of Reverend Samuel Parris (Adam J. Salter) whose daughter has been ill. The rumour in this devout community is that her sickness may be caused by witchcraft: Parris had seen both girls dancing in the woods with his Jamaican slave Tituba (Yvonne Webber). Questions arise - just what was going on there and who else was involved? - and other townsfolk raise concerns, leading to other people being accused of witchcraft. An investigator, Reverend Hale (Duncan Driver) becomes involved and a court is convened under Judge Hathorne (Samuel Hannan-Morrow) and Deputy Governor Danforth (Mark Bunnett).

Abigail, it becomes clear, hopes to have Elizabeth executed as a witch in order to marry Proctor herself, while the other girls - adolescents with little outlet for self-expression or sexuality - may simply have enjoyed the dancing as a break from their mundane existence. But the existence of the Devil and witches is not doubted in this pious, theocratic community and as the hysteria mounts the voice of reason may not be heard.

In working with set designer Michael Sparks, Best says she wanted "no structures, no walls, no doors ... I wanted the feeling of nature encroaching on their attempts at civilisation".

Ropes are being used to create a forest and have the added associations of entrapment and execution, both of which suit the play.

Best says she loved playing Elizabeth - "I think she's a beautiful character".

Now the role is being played by Sekuless and marks her return to the Canberra stage after several years studying and performing overseas. Unlike Best, who had no religious upbringing, she is an Anglican but like the director she found it a challenge to enter into the mindset of the characters.

Sekuless says she sees Elizabeth as "one of the only characters who have a decent faith, or the right kind of faith - the right mixture of faith and morality".

She says Elizabeth is "the heart of the show", the character the audience can identify with and want to take the side of while John Proctor is the "head", a man who has to realise his own dishonesty and decide how to act.

Sekuless says that although Elizabeth Proctor is repeatedly described - by herself and others - as "cold", she doesn't think that is accurate. As a betrayed spouse, she is understandably hurt, and she is said to be "ill": as the mother of three children she might well be suffering from what would later be called postnatal depression. And she lives in a repressive, joyless society where work and church seem to be the major activities.

The Crucible, she says, is "very dark" with little in the way of light relief, although she does note that before Elizabeth is seen, she is heard singing to her children - in a society where music isn't encouraged apart from psalm-singing, it seemed significant.

"I chose to make it a lullaby ... it's about her love and her faith, expressing it in her own way."