Noel Coward’s Easy Virtue is a brave and witty play. It was considered so scandalous in 1925 that it opened in New York rather than London.
The idea of a young man from a “good” family marrying a divorcee – and indeed one who had enjoyed several lovers – was regarded as unsuitable for the delicate sensitivities of the British public. Apparently, the Lord Chamberlain, the censor at the time, regarded the subject matter with as much distain as the young man’s family did in the play.
The genius of Coward is that his plays are funny (and in this version the audience is laughing the whole way through), but his characters have depth.
The skill of staging his work is to bring out the humour without making the characters a parody. This production by Cambridge Arts Theatre, directed by Trevor Nunn, achieves this with panache. This is must-see.
Alice Orr-Ewing as Larita, the sophisticated, glamourous older woman who has married young John, a rather naive cherished son, is magnificent. Her deportment is wonderful, her speeches hit home, who on earth wouldn’t be enchanted by her.
And this is the point. She is too worldly for this sedate English family with their faux morality, their hypocritical hospitality and their tea-out-of-bone-china lives.
Greta Scacchi plays John’s mother who is so appalled at what has happened she tells her daughters: “Even your father’s affairs were nothing compared to this.”
Meanwhile John’s father, played by Michael Praed, is rather bemused and amused by a woman he sees as beautiful and clever. The characters have a spectrum of reactions. John’s former girlfriend Sarah (great performance by Lisa Ambalavanar) decides Larita is actually a good sort.
Meanwhile, John’s youngest sister Hilda cannot wait to see the deep-veined fury her mother won’t be able to hide over luncheon.
As ever with Coward, the dialogue is brilliantly funny, arch, and acerbic. It’s remarkable that he wrote this play when he was just 25. He said he wanted to write a tragedy as if it were a comedy. Indeed, marriage as it is painted here is tragic.
Great sacrifices are made in pursuit of respectability. Very strong performances here from Imogen Elliot as John’s religious and indignant sister Marion who tries to give Larita advice; Grace Hogg-Robinson as younger sister Hilda, who at first thinks the whole thing is a hoot; Joseph Potter as the young husband John; Kishore Walker as Philip – a young friend of the family and Jamie Wilkes as Charles the one person who is a true fellow spirit of divorcee Larita.
You can see in this play, the beginnings of the ideas for characters in Coward’s later plays. Mrs Whittaker, who over-reacts to all events and describes everything as if her life depends on it, foreshadows Judith, the over-acting, actress mother in Hay Fever. In the knowing dialogue and understanding between Larita and Charles, you can see Amanda and Elyot in Private Lives, the couple who can neither live together or apart.
The direction of the play is crisp. It is fast-paced and slick. There is a very clever use of the stage and the costumes and set are delightful. A world is created. It isn’t our world any longer.
Most people don’t live in houses big enough to hold dances and with tennis lawns in the garden. But we still have our own prejudices. Today, John’s family home might not be so lavish, but he might well marry someone that challenged his family’s assumptions.
Ah but would the play today be written with such searing wit and such joyous use of language. The play is a great night out, entertainment at its finest. I felt the spirit of Noel Coward.
Easy Virtue is at Cambridge Arts Theatre until Saturday, March 7
