Collected plays - Nol Coward

Volume Four of Nol Coward's plays contains a selection of Coward'splays from the thirties and forties which includes Blithe Spirit, acomedy that centres around the spirit medium Madame Arcati. The playthat mocks sudden death was produced at precisely the moment when bombswere bringing it to Britain "I shall ever be grateful, for the almostpsychic gift that enabled me to write Blithe Spiritin five days duringone of the darkest years of the war." The play was for years thelongest-running comedy in the history of British theatre. PresentLaughterfollows the life of Garry Essendine, a world-weary,middle-aged projection of the dilettante, debonair persona -self-obsessed and dressing-gowned who struts through the play like aneducated peacock. It is a comedy about the 'theatricals' that Nol bestknew and loved, and was originally a star vehicle for himself. It isthe closest to an autobiographical play that Coward ever wrote.

ThisHappy Breedis a saga of a lower middle-class family; and three shorterpieces fromTonight at 8.30 - is a farce set in the South of France,and serves as an oblique tribute to Frederick Lonsdale; The AstonishedHeartis about the decay of a psychiatrist's mind through personalsexual obsession. Red Peppers, which closes the volume, was a cynicaltribute to the lost music halls of the First World War.