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A fast-moving, dapper and contemporary performance, that stays true to CowardSummary
Rating
Excellent
If holiday makers need something to chase these summer blues away, then the two contrasting comic plays currently at Southwold and Aldeburgh theatres offer fun and frolics for all the family. Now who doesn’t like to be beside the seaside? The season opened to full houses with Noel Coward’s Private Lives and Ken Ludwig’s A Fox on the Fairway
Coward’s play, a 1930’s comedy of manners in three acts, is smartly reduced to a swift two here, under the careful direction of Ashleigh Sendin. She provides witty comic action with a sideways look at marriage, manners, and monogamy, and the crisp repartée is ably handled by Darrell Brockis and Charlotte Parry as Elyot and Amanda.
Both characters are stylish and they inhabit the acting space with a physical fluidity that is amusing in itself, yet also acts as a wonderful visual metaphor to support the frippery and seeming foolishness of the pair. Their attitudes and posturing could leave an audience challenged in the present climate, but here the piece rolls along with quip and barb. It is a relief to see that in the darker moments Amanda gives as good as she get.
Private passions and public behaviours are satirised by Coward by comparing marriages. In contrast with our rebellious and passionate duo, pent up Sibyl (delightfully played by Emma Parsons) and conventional Victor (Jamie Symons) are both steadfast and perhaps without a spark of passion. In the end Coward exposes the underbelly of marriage, as he sees it, where loyalties are destructive, divided and often reunited when the public face of relationships are exposed with all their contradictions – much of which is probably best kept behind closed doors.
A minimal sleek set, with its white sharp outlines against black drapes, offers a suitable backdrop for this romance of brittle attraction. What seems light and bright on the surface has a darkness within. Treachery and tradition, love, and lust along with a fine line of mannered mockery, is navigated with aplomb by the cast – showing us that private lives are seldom on view in public places. The grizzly behaviour of these complex characters demonstrates that heavenly notions of relationships can easily become a hellish reality. Coward hints as much with his rather mournful and wistful romantic song that he wrote for the play: “Someday I’ll find you…. true to the dream I am dreaming.”
On the first night the audience was enthralled with this fast-moving dapper performance, enjoying the wit and style of a production that stays true to Coward and contemporary audiences alike.
Written by: Noel Coward
Directed by Ashleigh Sendin
Produced by Southwold and Aldeburgh Theatre
Private Lives runs until 12 August. Further information and bookings can be found here.
