SALLY Reid currently finds herself inside a giant petri dish with three sexually-charged people who are tearing each other's lab coats off so often the buttons need constant re-sewing.

And she's clearly having the most fun imaginable.

Sally, who recently starred in BBC sitcom Scot Squad, is appearing in this week's Oran Mor play We Can All Agree To Pretend This Never Happened.

Written by an American Emma Goidel, it tells of a research team based in Siberia who can't come up with the answer to global warming, so they fake the results.

But in the process, the contained scientists become stir crazy. And once they've exhausted all the sexual possibilities, life in the lab becomes ever darker.

"My character, Liz, is the head scientist," says Sally, grinning. "The team are holed up in this freezing lab, trying to find a cure for climate change but it's all going too slowly, so Liz tries to speed up the results.

"Meantime, they're all going mad and there's all sorts of cross relationships going on."

She adds, offering an enigmatic grin. "And there's something of a murder mystery going on as well."

Philadelphia has it's own version of A Play, Pie and A Pint. And last year, a Glasgow-created play was performed in the American city.

This play which also boasts Robbie Jack, Helen McAlpine and James Young in the cast, is Glasgow's chance to reciprocate.

However, Sally, who trained at Langside College, Glasgow and with the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, points out nothing can be lost in translation.

"It doesn't have language jokes," she says. "Instead it has true farce elements of physical, double-door comedy. And when you add to that the B Movie feel, the horror gasps and all of that, it's a play that could play anywhere."

Sally, who grew up in Perth, is one of Scotland's top - and most versatile - actors. Over the years, she's proved herself to be a Tron panto veteran, she's worked on a huge range of productions, with the likes of the Citizens' Theatre and the National Theatre of Scotland.

She even played Chic Murray recently. Yes, Chic Murray, the gruff-voiced comedy legend, in a monologue written for the National Portrait Gallery's performance piece, honouring Scottish legends.

"I love the idea of switching genders to play a character," says the lady who offered a terrific Tiny Tim at the Tron panto.

"It's a real challenge. And I loved researching the life and jokes of Chic Murray."

In keeping with Ms Reid's delight in gender switching and defying expectation, her Siberia-based scientist is fairly masculine.

"My character is very direct. She acts like a man and talks like a man, right down to the way she stands. And I love it. I'm thinking she's a bit like Tina Fey doing a male character on Saturday Night Live."

Sally, who appeared in Only An Excuse? at Hogmanay and in theatre sketch show Watson's Wind-Up, loves the fact the play has a B Movie sensibility, all heightened melodrama and lots of gasps and raised eyebrows.

"One of my favourite films of all time is Clue," she says smiling of the 1985 film starring Tim Curry and Madeline Kahn.

In fact, she doesn't simply speak of the movie, she enraptures.

"I saw it when I was a kid and thought it amazing. It has this great melodrama and I just kept on watching it. I used to watch Clue and then go to my friends and ask them to act it out.

"I'd tell them which characters to play, but then I'd be shocked when they'd rather got to the park to play."

Sally adds; "I've still got in on video and now DVD. I did have the poster on my wall, but I thought that was maybe taking it a bit too far."

Clearly, Sally friends didn't have her acting DNA.

"I love acting, and I love the variety the job offers me, from doing a Chekhov play one minute, playing the depressed middle sister to appearing in a B movie farce," she maintains. "It's great fun."

Just to add to the fun element, the set for this play is shaped like a giant petri dish.

"And we've all got a petri dish in our hands!"

Ah, heavy with symbolism; we're all little, desperate microbes in this world, scurrying around, trying to procreate, working out ways to survive. And when we're starved of excitement we'll create some.

"That's it," says Sally, laughing. "I've got the chance to play a scientist in a petri dish. And I can honestly say, if i weren't in this play I'd want to go see it."

* We Can All Agree To Pretend This Never Happened, Oran Mor, until Saturday.