THE gamble of staging Chicago has proved to be one worth taking by Kelty Musical Association.

It is a show that came from the play by Maurine Dallas Watkins with music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb, and it needs a lot of high quality leading members of the cast.

The production team of director Gary Gibb, choreographer Lynne Gibb and musical director Ross Hamilton, invested a lot of time in putting together the cast and it all came up trumps on Wednesday when the show opened at Dunfermline's Carnegie Hall.

The three main leads, Amy Elder as Roxie Hart; Vicky Sharp as Velma Kelly; and Mark Grieve, as Bill Flynn, were literally perfection while Rebecca Anderson as Cook County jail's Matron Mamma Morton; Darren Johnson as Roxie's husband Amos Hart, and Derek Walker, as reporter Mary Sunshine, was also outstanding, along with Fraser McLoughlin, who played the man Roxie murdered, Fred Casely.

It had to be the biggest cast Kelty have had in the modern era (44 players) but there were literally no failures in this story of two dancers who want to be top stars while skilful lawyer Billy Flynn, always out to make a fast buck, were backed by a tremendous cast.

The production is set in the 1920s and the music is so important to the success of the show and an amazing orchestral performance, under the expert guidance of Ross Hamilton nightly, helped the success story.

The quality of the singing and dancing was top notch and the superb costumes saw several packed houses show their appreciation