Stratford Festival 2019/Private Lives by Noël Coward, directed by Carey Perloff, Avon Theatre, May 30 to Oct. 26. Tickets available at stratfordfestival.ca.
One of my great theatrical pleasures is watching a production that makes me see a play that I know well, with fresh eyes. Such is director Carey Perloff’s treatment of Private Lives (1930) by Noël Coward at the Stratford Festival. Perloff and her actors give substance to both the play and its author.
I have always enjoyed Coward’s comedies of manners for their sophisticated wit and on-the-edge morality. A coy naughtiness, encased in champagne bubbles, dominates the slender plots. The playwright’s breezy, brittle dialogue seems to skip along the surface, rarely if ever, venturing into dark waters. In this production of Private Lives, however, Perloff presents troubled people in grave crisis, but most importantly, without losing any of Coward’s bitchy humour. Private Lives is still confection, but with a bite.
The action, such as it is, can be summed up in a few sentences. Amanda Prynne (Lucy Peacock) and Elyot Chase (Geraint Wyn Davies) were divorced five years ago. Each has now married someone else, Victor Prynne (Mike Shara) and Sibyl Chase (Sophia Walker), respectively. Both couples are spending their honeymoons in a swanky Deauville hotel, in adjoining rooms with adjoining balconies. Amanda and Elyot run away to Amanda’s flat in Paris when they discover that they are still in love, despite their penchant for personality conflict, leaving Victor and Sibyl to chase after them. A fifth character is Amanda’s always angry Paris maid Louise (Sarah Dodd) who is always good for a laugh or two.
Peacock can be credited with Private Lives’ newfound gravitas. Although she can toss off Coward’s sardonic badinage with the best, she also invests real emotions into his words. Rather than spouting Coward’s clever wordplay only for laughs, which is custom, Peacock treats the arch language as absolutely real, and from the heart. She’s not the usual Amanda with affectations, but one who talks common sense about hers and Elyot’s precarious relationship. She’s capable of philosophical concepts. Right from the start, Peacock’s Amanda shows her inner tension, and we understand instantly that she married Victor for his conventional lifestyle. Victor represents safety as opposed to Elyot’s danger. Peacock is brilliant in presenting an Amanda who has an unusually heavy presence on stage both in words and deeds.
Shara gives the best interpretation of Victor Prynne, ever. He is not a mere one dimensional, pompous Dudley Do-Right. Instead, he presents a man of reason who is trying to find a solution to a very real problem, always retaining his sense of honour, while trying to maintain the dignity of all concerned. Certainly, he is angry, but he also shows strength of character. In his dialogue with the three other characters, he never backs down, no matter what insults they hurl at him. Shara shows a Victor who is not the usual cypher. He has a real presence on stage, and in fact, seems to drive the action of the second act Paris scene. Simply put, Shara’s Victor is a revelation. He has become a major player.
There are problems with the other characters, though they don’t distract from Perloff’s overall intention of giving substance to the play. While the director has grasped the nub of the issue as witnessed by the performances of Peacock and Shara, she hasn’t succeeded in elevating Elyot and Sibyl out of caricature and stereotype. Both need to be deeper portrayals, particularly Walker’s Sibyl, to even out the playing field.
Davies can’t seem to decide if Elyot is a narcissistic brat who is the king of the bon mot, or a man capable of saying something meaningful. In Elyot’s truthful, self-reflective moments, Davies shows us the character’s true soul, but then his Elyot breaks away and suddenly reverts to fun and games and mannered delivery. To give credit where credit is due, one of the strengths of Davies’ Elyot, is revealing his very nasty side which is usually glossed over for laughs. In Davies, we see actual venom, which is a good thing, as is his charming turn at the piano singing Coward songs with Peacock. Nonetheless, if only Perloff and Davies had rounded off both sides of Elyot’s character. At this point, Davies performs a split personality, which gives his acting a jagged quality.
The usually reliable Walker rarely rises beyond a one dimensional Sibyl. She is a whiney bitch, period. Yet, as in Davies’ performance, there are hints of something deeper. Elyot married a “feminine creature”, looking for frilly softness after having dealt with Amanda’s cuts and jabs for three years. Sibyl, it turns out, has the potential to be a harridan who always wants her own way. What we needed here is less weeping and wailing and more calmly directed daggers. The great what-ifs of this production are what would Private Lives be like with Elyot and Sibyl demonstrating the same level of realism as Amanda and Victor?
I’m not sure about Ken MacDonald’s set, which Perloff describes in her notes as a “paper cut-out fantasy world”. I just saw odd shapes. Having a fantasy set seems counterproductive to Perloff’s quest for subtext and meaning. I also found Christina Poddubiuk’s period costumes more dowdy than glamorous. I prefer the latter when it comes to Coward. Kimberly Purtell’s lighting attempts to capture the fantasy of the set through different colour schemes, but it seems redundant.
Director Perloff and her cast have given us a new look at Coward, but one that doesn’t go far enough. We must, however, be thankful for showing us a Coward capable of more profound concerns underpinning a newly discovered world of disenchantment.
LUDWIG VAN TORONTO
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