Sometimes at the theatre all you want is to see a couple of consummate pros take a classic out for a spin. Here, Patricia Hodge and Nigel Havers, both in their 70s, bring an autumnal tinge to Noel Coward’s 1930 comedy about a frivolous, stylish, waspish couple, who can’t live together or apart.
Christopher Luscombe’s production, brought in to London after a regional tour, looks on the outside like a solid rendition that will draw in the coach parties and won’t frighten the horses. But with older leads there is an urgency to the way Amanda and Elyot – having accidentally booked adjoining rooms in Deauville for honeymoons with their second, much-younger spouses – run off together to seize a last chance at mutual happiness.
