Noel Coward’s Blithe Spirit

Successfully opening our 2019 summer season was an elegant production of the classic farce celebrating one of our greatest playwrights.

“True West End quality entertainment showcased on the iconic Aldeburgh Jubilee Hall stage once home to Britten and Pears”.

In 1941 Coward escaped war-torn London and travelled to the Italianate village of Portmeirion on the north east coast of Wales. Within seven days he had written the first draft of Blithe Spirit – An Improbable Farce. When the play opened in London later that year he only changed two lines. The production was a major success and became his longest running play in the West End.

Noel Coward was a celebrated actor, alongside being one of Britain’s most successful writers, the dialogue of his plays is a performer’s dream, and trips off the actor’s tongue. You can imagine him playing all the parts himself.

In a masterpiece of wit, hilarious farce & the supernatural, a successful writer holds a séance at his house to research his next book, and gets much, much more than he bargained for.  This new, spring-heeled & razor-sharp production, was directed by award-winning Phil Clark. A tale of “One man – Two wives, and at least one ghost!”  we had a great deal of fun dealing with the supernatural and developing the exciting and often dangerous relationships between the mortals and the immortals. Coward’s work is often naughty, allowing us to bring to life the themes of deceit, selfishness, marriage, and infidelity.