Private Lives

Description

One of Coward's best-loved classics in a single-play edition Coward's wit and precision as a modern dramatist is nowhere better exemplified than in this classic modern plays from 1930. Elyot Chase and Amanda Prynne (originally played by Gertrude Lawrence and Noel Coward), recently divorced from one another five years previously, arrive coincidentally at the same French hotel. They are honeymooning with their respective new spouses. Encountering one another by chance, each is at once horrified and fascinated by the other. Together they leave for Paris and begin a roundelay of quarrels and love intrigues that culminate in their getting back together.

Noel Coward (b. in 1899) is one of Britain's most celebrated writers. He made his name as a playwright with The Vortex (1924), in which he also appeared. His numerous other successful plays included Fallen Angels (1925), Hay Fever (1925), Private Lives (1933), Design for Living (1933) and Blithe Spirit (1941). He died in 1973.

Noel Coward's glittering gem * Sam Marlowe, The Times, 28.1.09 * The brilliance of Coward's conceit... is as sparkling as it ever was. * John Nathan, Jewish Chronicle, 30.1.09 * The play is marriage in three parts, but with better jokes and an interval. * Nina Caplan, Time Out London, 5.2.09 * In a word - go. * Dominic Cavendish, Daily Telegraph, 3.3.11 *