Contemporaries of Coward, getting on for a century ago, cooed with delight at his waspish sensibility, his willingness to push against the accepted norms of society, or thundered disapproval at his affront to common decency.

Private Lives does not poke fun at the way the middle classes actually carried on but, tongue-in-cheek and with ironically raised eyebrows mocked the way they might have behaved in the elegant world created by Mr.Coward.  Of course times change and what was once risqué – for example unmarried, albeit divorced people, making love on stage – becomes unremarkable.

In director, Tom Attenborough’s, production we find, unsurprisingly, no maturity, but a group of adolescents pretending or at least trying hard to be grown-ups.  Like characters from a pop song expressing undying love only to find that the love actually needs resuscitating within a few years or months or even days.  Where, in Wilde we have bon mots tending to the gnomic, in Coward they lean towards the frolicsome and are easily bruised by too much thought.

Whilst Shakespeare may be our contemporary Coward decidedly is not and we look to revivals rather as we may look to a Baroque concerto performed on pre-classical instruments, that is, to get a certain sound and feel, indeed a style.  So, in previous revivals of Private Lives, we might have found plenty of bubbles whilst here we have Elyot squirming with anger and stamping his feet with frustration at his new wife’s refusal to be submissively compliant to his wishes, like a child throwing a tantrum at the checkout because his mother won’t buy him the enticingly displayed sweets.

Laura Rogers as Amanda bounces elegantly around the stage being deliciously arch and the gadfly to Elyot’s elusive equanimity.  Alluring and argumentative in equal measure she squares up to her ex with all the assurance of a tennis pro who knows she can give as good as she gets whilst loving the opponent that gives her most trouble.

Tom Chambers, as Elyot, certainly has plenty of fun with the part and, like most men, finds he cannot handle his emotions as well as he thought.  He’s a dab hand at the physical stuff like the fights and the dancing all of which add colour to the very ‘modern’ relationship.

Richard Teverson as something stiff from the city, who lacks the necessary lion taming skills to properly handle the, in truth, untamable Amanda, summons up just the right amount of righteous bluster.  Charlotte Ritchie brings some style to the bemused yet determined Sybil who has inadvertently stumbled into the ongoing and unresolved love affair of the central characters.    ★★★☆☆     Graham Wyles     15^th March 2016

Photo by Alastair Muir