Review: PRIVATE LIVES, Ambassadors Theatre

“Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art,” Eleanor Roosevelt astutely pointed out.

Private Lives – resurrected to mark the 50th anniversary of droll writer Noël Coward’s death in 1973 – stars two beautiful old people, lending this cleverly, scathing production an interesting new slant on how the very rich regard sex and love, and generally behave badly.

A still very debonair Nigel Havers as dashing Elyot, and Patricia Hodge, very much at the top of her game as sensational Amanda – aged 72 and 75 respectively – command the stage of the newly refurbished Ambassadors Theatre. This Best Exotic Marigold Hotel-esque version of Private Lives, that kicked off at Theatre Royal Bath back in 2021, is the first production to grace the old dame in Covent Garden that’s been given a multi-million-pound nip and tuck. Remedial repairs include an access lift, six wheelchair spaces, accessible toilet and improved audio support for the hearing impaired.

Originally opening in the West End back in 1930, the play featured Coward – at the tenderer age of 31 – in the leading role of Elyot, presumably with no worries yet about access lifts or hearing impairment services. Although, there is a funny comic aside by Elyot, who describes a dear old lady “blowing all those shrimp through her ear trumpet”.

The roots of Private Lives sound a bit like a premise from one of Coward’s comic masterpieces. He wrote the play during a two-week convalescence after contracting influenza in Shanghai and then cabled Gertrude Lawrence, instructing her to be available in the autumn to appear in his new creation. Young 23-year-old Laurence Olivier was also part of the cast.

Many renderings of the play have appeared in the West End, on Broadway; and on film, radio and TV, with celebrated names such as Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, Maggie Smith, Robert Stephens, Matthew Macfadyen, Alan Rickman, Lindsay Duncan and Penelope Keith.

The plot revolves round a divorced couple, who discover one another while they’re honeymooning with new spouses, Sibyl (excellent Natalie Walter, with the most irritating whining voice) and Victor (Dugald Bruce-Lockhart giving us a moving depiction of someone lacking in confidence trying to be imperious and masterful) in the same hotel in Deauville. Even though they admit they had a tempestuous relationship first time round, they realise they’re still in love. What could possibly go wrong?

There’s been a long history of fictional warring couples: Beatrice and Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing, Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind, Pride and Prejudice’s Elizabeth and Darcy, and George and Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Director Christopher Luscombe’s blocking of his feuding lovers that are 40 years older than intended works well. Although Havers and Hodge might not be quite as nimble as they once were, the fight scenes pack a mighty punch. There’s also a touching layer of poignancy in their performances, hinting at a longing for something from the past that with actors in their 70s has real meaning.

Designer Simon Higlett’s sets are simple, but exquisite. Quite rightly, the exterior of the chic, softly lit (lighting design by Mark Jonathan) hotel is pristine white with pink striped awnings. And Amanda’s Parisian apartment is an Art Deco whirlwind in Chinese reds and golds, with marble columns and a joie de vivre that reflects her electric personality.

There are a few, tiny wrinkles. Havers delivers his lines a bit too fast and swallows some of them in the first act, but he does come into his own after the interval. And I would have liked to have seen Hodge in costumes more sympathetic to a sophisticated, mature woman (sleeves, please, for starters).

This is a safe and settled delivery of Private Lives, but one bristling with chemistry between two beautiful older troupers. There is the odd revelation along the way, including Havers tinkling the ivories rather wonderfully. And Hodge summing up the agony and elation of grown-up love in her beautiful rendition of Coward’s earworm song, "Some Day I’ll Find You", with her emphasis on the spoken final word – again.

Private Lives runs at the Ambassadors Theatre until November 25

Photo credit: Tristram Kenton