Private Lives

As I’ve been keen to comment several times before, if you’re a dedicated theatre goer and are ever in or near to the Market Town of Oswestry in the glorious English county of Shropshire, be sure to check ‘What’s On’ at the Attfield Theatre. Based within the magnificent Guildhall at Bailey Head and with only 100 seats, such is the popularity of the resident company that it is often difficult to get tickets for regular productions. If you’re lucky enough to do so and judging by the sheer quality of the Noel Coward period comedy ‘Private Lives’ I had the pleasure of watching on Thursday evening, you certainly won’t be disappointed!

Noel Coward wrote ‘Private Lives’ in 1930 while convalescing from a short illness and directed its premiere performance at the King’s Theatre in Edinburgh in August that year. Following a short tour, the play opened at London’s Phoenix Theatre in September 1930 and included Noel himself in the cast together with Gertrude Lawrence, the famous actress, singer and musical comedy performer of the day. It returned to the West End in 1944 at London’s Apollo Theatre and since then has been successfully presented by literally hundreds of theatre companies, both amateur and professional, all over the world, many of which, I feel sure, will be scrambling to stage a centennial production of the play in 2030.

Despite being 96 years old, Noel Coward’s masterpiece has stood the test of time and is one of the most sophisticated and entertaining plays ever written, extremely funny and still totally relevant to the humour of today.

Two couples, both previously married and divorced, are now remarried to each other’s spouses and, purely by chance and previously unknown to either of them, are honeymooning during exactly the same week in the very same luxury hotel in the seaside town of Deauville, Normandy’s answer to the French Riviera. To make matters even worse, highly comical for the benefit of the audience, the rooms in their hotel are adjoining! So too are the balconies where their story begins with Sybil, now married to Elyot having previously been joined in wedlock to Victor - don’t worry, things will become clearer as my report continues – are enjoying the spectacular sea view over the English Channel before preparing to dress for dinner and a visit to the hotel’s casino.

Elyot and Sybil Chase are clearly very much in love with each other but it’s not entirely all sweetness and light in their newly married life together with an underlying current of mistrust about their previous partners still very much the subject of conversation. This first scene of the play was brilliantly performed by Nick Chesters and Michaela Turner who set the mood perfectly for all the fun and frolics that were soon to follow.

At the start of what could easily be likened to one of London Whitehall Theatre’s wildest farces, popularized in the 1950’s by the notorious Brian Rix - long before my time, but I’ve seen the classic TV clips - no sooner had Elyot and Sybil exited through the balcony French doors back into their room, than Amanda and Victor, appeared on the balcony from their own adjoining room.

With both their former tempestuous marriages still very much the topic of discussion, and Victor’s obvious jealous streak about Elyot still rumbling around in the background, their dialogue was hilarious and wonderfully played out by Jake Baker as Victor Prynne and Debbie Jones as his new wife, Amanda (Mandy). Much to our amusement, the conversation repeatedly focused on Victor’s resentful and threatening thoughts towards Elyot and at one stage, in sheer frustration, Amanda openly admitted that she too had actually broken four gramophone records over his head.

As they disappeared back into their room. Elyot appeared again through his balcony door carrying two champagne cocktails on a tray, followed seconds later by Amanda through her own balcony door. She had quickly changed into her evening dress and was also carrying two champagne cocktails on a tray. Amanda was the first to notice that her hotel neighbour was, in fact, her ex-husband Elyot and there was a brief but polite conversation before she quickly disappeared back into her room as Sibyl entered again through hers.

Now with both Elyot and Amanda in a dilemma and desperate to abandon their honeymoons to avoid any problems with Sybil and Victor, the fun really started as both of them dreamed up the most bizarre reasons for leaving the hotel after only just arriving, so ridiculous that, needless to say, neither of their plans washed with their respective partners.

After a hugely comical series of shenanigans and to cut a long story short, our four honeymooners were forced to face their true feelings for each other and realizing that their new marriages were a bit of a sham, attempted to escape from their ill-matched partners by quickly repacking and returning to Paris under the cover of darkness.

Three days later in Amanda’s fabulous apartment in the French Capital and with a renewed passion for each other, it didn’t take long for Amanda and Elyot to start arguing again and whilst it was clear that they couldn’t live with each other, they couldn’t live without each other either!

When they were discovered a few days later by their jilted spouses, all four lovers had to face facts and finally acknowledge just who was really suited to who and, following another round of quarrels and disagreements, Elyot and Amanda took the bull by the horns and quietly sneaked out with their suitcases leaving Victor and Sibyl still arguing.

We had enjoyed a wonderful evening’s entertainment, fast-paced, emotional and very amusing, with a truly brilliant cast which also included Carrie Fisher as the French servant girl who attended to our four divorcees’ every need in Act Three and played a very funny and convincing role spoken entirely in French. Une très bonne performance!

Still maintaining the professionalism of the sets we have enjoyed so much in the past at the Attfield Theatre, The Deauville Hotel Balcony in Act One and Amanda’s Parisian Apartment in Acts Two and Three – were so brilliantly designed and of such quality that it was difficult to imagine that I wasn’t sitting and watching the play in a London West End Theatre! Very much in the 1930’s art deco vogue, Amanda’s apartment, in particular, had been beautifully decorated with pinky-grey walls and royal blue doors, tastefully enhanced by a cream vertical spiral design. The furnishings too had been carefully chosen and included a zebra skin covered chaise longue, chair and rug together with mahogany sideboards and tables. An interesting array of stylish ornaments and devices including a wind-up gramophone and French style telephone together with three stunning portraits on the walls completed the overall picture.

The costumes too were all perfectly in thirties fashion with appropriate styles and a variety of colours.

I also loved the way that appropriately themed music was used to introduce and close each of the scenes which I learned afterwards were all adaptations of original Noel Coward songs. Another very clever touch.

But, as always, my final comments must go to Director and Production Designer, Tony Holtham, who had honed every fine detail of Noel Coward’s classic romp to sheer perfection. He had carefully addressed the challenging relationships between the four main characters to provide some highly plausible moments which were both comical and relaxed and at other times emotionally charged and highly fraught!

As the play programme quite rightly quotes – “I think very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives.”

The Production Manager was Malcolm Lord, The Stage Manager was Andy Turner with Lighting Design by Glynn Swift and Sound Recording by Malcolm Lord.

Thank you so much for inviting me to your latest production and, as always, for your warm welcome. Whilst I have now been honoured with the responsibility of NODA West Midlands District 3 (Staffordshire), I very much look forward to visiting you all again for a trip to ‘Sheila’s Island’ in May.

Chris Bell, Acting Regional Representative District 2

Oswestry is at the Northern part of the West Midlands Region but a trip to the venue is always a delight due to the wonderful reception but also due to the wonderful performance this talented company are going to present.

Private Lives most certainly lived up to my expectation. The acting was wonderful from the cast of five with spot on timing regarding not only the line delivery but also in keeping the action flowing.

The set most certainly lived up to the reputation I have become accustomed to. The balcony was superb with the name of the hotel projected onto it. The reason why not painted on; well, I had my thoughts and was proven correct. The set opened to the most wonderful Parisian apartment as described by Chris – totally amazing in detail.

I already have my seat booked for Sheila’s Island. I will not provide any spoiler but can not wait to see the set for this one.

Andy Brown, Councillor NODA West Midlands.

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