A Masterful Take on Noel's Classic

DAILY MAIL
October 12, 2001 (re write of article published 5th October 2001)

Michael Coveney

Private Lives by Noel Coward: Albery Threatre

Verdict: Melancolic new slant on brilliant Coward comedy
4 out of 5 stars

TWO violent acids in a matrimonial bottle.

That's Elyot and Amanda for you, celebrating five years of divorce by honeymooning on adjacent balconies with new partners in Deauville.

Coward's 1930 comedy is one of the great plays of the last century.  Alan Rickman and Lindsay Duncan as Elyot and Amanda have redefined their roles in the most brilliant fashion, sculpted them to their own special talent while honouring the Master.

Too much in love to like each other very much, Elyot and Amanda are epitome of a modern, messy marriage, relaunched on the bitter sea of experience.

So it seems in Howard Davies's coruscating production, which Tim Hatley has designed first as a towering wedding cake of balconies and then a red bohemian den in Paris later on.

Rickman is sometimes too slackjawed for his own good. But his impeccable timing and magnificent wounded egomania have never been seen to better advantage: he releases Coward in an entirely new idiom.

Older than usual for the role (the character is just 30), he plays Elyot's vanity like some heroic venture, squinting at everyone through a veil of delightful disdain.

Miss Duncan bats it all away like a trouper,moving silkily into pole position as an ice-queen of blonde bravura without once resorting to superficial brightness or camp gestures.

In support, Adam Godley is a wonderful spindly Victor Prynne, while Emma Fielding is sheer delight as Sybil, despite a dank wig making her look like an upturned mop.

 

 

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