Experience: 6/10

By Noel Coward

Adapted by Christopher Luscombe

Venue: Connaught Theatre

Date: Thursday 22nd June 2006

This was a reasonably enjoyable evening, marred only by being nearly blinded by a badly positioned mirror in the dressing room scenes. Fortunately, the offending mirror was partly covered as the set was redressed, so I was OK, but the poor chap next to me was still being dazzled. Unfortunate, and it did spoil the end scenes for me.

I find this a wordy and rather arch play – still fun, but nothing like as enjoyable as Coward’s main works. The performances were fine, set design and lighting (with one exception) fine, though not on as lavish a scale as the previous production (seen at Richmond Theatre). I particularly enjoyed Miles Western as the director’s “personal assistant”, and the short scene where the star gets the better of the director at the end, convincing him of her vulnerability. Good fun.

© 2006 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me