Sydney Reviews

Festooned with verbal foliage that has not desiccated over eight decades, Noel Coward’s Present Laughter is a present of much needed laughter leading up to the silly season.

The first thing that arrests the eye of the audience in Louise Fischer’s New Theatre production is Tom Bannerman’s gorgeous set, its hue of blue and gilt, its easy chair and sofa charm and peacock cushion symbolism.

Then it’s time for Michael Schell’s lighting to shine, beginning the show with a cheeky brief spotlight effect, a sly hint to the narrative’s theatrical bent, and then throughout the play continuing to illuminate and sometimes obfuscate the on stage shenanigans.

Caught in that initial spotlight is Larissa Turton as Daphne Stillington, a smitten fan of actor, Gary Essendine, heir to the theatrical throne of England, its territories and dominions, and the rest of the known world. She has misplaced her latchkey and has spent the night with Essendine. To him, she is but a one night stand, for her, the start of something more enduring.

In short order, Daphne is put straight by the actor, his ex wife Liz, and personal secretary, Monica, and bid adieu from actor’s abode. It is not the first time a lapsed latchkey holder has latched on to the stage star, a love’em and leave’em Lothario who sees sex as a mutually rewarding benefit of his celebrity. 

At fifty something, Essendine retains the heady zest of adolescence. A Peter Pan principal of the Peter Pan principle, Essendine sees himself the first and possibly the second wonders of the modern world, a feted thespian with a fetish for dressing gowns perfectly well aware that he possess star quality, the invigorating, infuriating, exhausting and exasperating lodestar of his life, a very Noel Coward character, who mirrors figuratively and literally, the author.

Peter Eyers is perfectly cast.

Readying to embark on an African tour, a conflict with his producers is compounded by another dalliance that threatens to overthrow Essendine’s social and professional bedrock.

This frolicsome, fastidious romp boasts an on song ensemble who navigate the wild whorls and intersections with comedic aplomb.

Lib Campbell, ramps the vamp, as Joanna Lyppiatt with impeccable phrasing and comic allure. Doubling as Miss Hamilton, Essendine’s Scottish spiritualist ciggie stealing housekeeper and stage mum aunt to drama queen Daphne, Lady Saltburn, Liz Grindley presents an accomplished class in contrasting characterisation.

Molly Haddon is cooly affecting as Garry’s ex wife, Liz, as is Emily Weare as Garry’s world weary secretary, Monica. Larissa Turton is terrific as the beguiling ingenue, Daphne Stillington, Luke Visentin very funny as the fanatical Chekovian, Roland Maule and Oliver Harcourt-Ham impresses as Essendine’s unflappable valet, Fred.

Michela Noonan and Rueben Solomon as Garry’s producers whose private and professional relationships with their friend and client are hysterically entwined complete this well calibrated casting cocktail. 

Costuming by Deborah Mulhall and Helen Kohlhagen is excellent, exquisitely adding to the definition the characters and complimenting the set.

Quip witted, with little that is strained or arid, this production of Present Laughter is infused with an abundance of physical and verbal vitality.