By Angela Rocco DeCarlo,copyright, 2011
“Blithe Spirit,” the 1941 Noel Coward comedy, playing at the intimate Costa Mesa Playhouse until September 25, allows theater-goers the opportunity to enjoy good talent, brilliant dialog, all amid some zany antics designed to conjure back to life the dear departed. The three-hour production is directed by David Anthony Blair.
Coward’s play opened in 1941 London during the worst of the German bombings – The Blitz - of Britain during World War II. So it might be easy to see how a creative exercise onstage, of retrieving loved ones from the grave, would resonate at that time in history. However, the play has enjoyed long life, with many revivals, during the past 70 years. It’s most recent incarnation on Broadway was in 2009 with Angela Lansbury in the key role of Madame Arcati, the eccentric medium, who accidentally conjures a dead wife, much to the chagrin of the current, alive wife.
The Costa Mesa specter hits the right notes of comedy and British sophistication without creeping anyone to pieces. The seven-member cast of this well-staged production is fortunate to be well-clothed and placed onto a nicely designed set, as they handle the required British accents with success. Author Coward took the title from the Percy Bysshe Shelly poem, “To A Skylark” – “Hail to thee blithe spirit, bird thou never wert….” Coward’s London office was destroyed in the wartime bombing and it is said he went away and wrote the play during a week in the countryside. “Blithe Spirit” ran for nearly 2,000 performances in London and more than 500, later in 1941, on Broadway. It’s still around because it is beautifully written and works. Actors have sparkling speeches, situations are amusing and the people never lose their cool – even when highly exasperated. What a treat to never have to hear dialog that resorts to vulgarity and code curse words. It is worth the ticket if only to hear humans speak so eloquently in every situation.
English socialites Ruth and Charles Condomine, well-played by Jennifer Pearce and Paul Griffiths respectively, host a dinner party and séance featuring a well-known local eccentric, medium Madame Arcati, played with a light zany touch, by Judy Jones. Charles plans to use the evening to research psychics for his next novel. Friends, Dr. and Mrs. Bradman, played by suitably scientific Dan Henry and charmingly giddy Norma Jean, respectively, round out the guest list. The doctor is a skeptic and his wife is willing to believe whatever may turn up once Arcati goes into her trance. The maid, Edith, played by Danielle Macinnis, is too-noisy a presence in early scenes. Though necessary later on.
Of course, the evening goes bump in the night and Arcati accidently conjures Charles’ dead first wife, Elvira, strongly played by Emily Price, to plague the proceedings. Her initial appearance is appropriately ghostly, until she settles in to demonstrate she just showed up to finish aggravating her husband, a job apparently left undone in life.
It is a marvelous tribute to art in the abstract that individuals such as these fine Costa Mesa actors work so hard to provide an evening’s entertainment for a group of strangers. The audience was suitably appreciative for the laughs and opportunity to contemplate what it would be like to have departed loved ones return. But most of all for an evening of sophisticated intelligent entertainment, without a hint of current TV sitcom mentality, marked by the lowest common denominator – usually inane “sex up your nose” nonsense. If only contemporary writers might grab a dictionary or thesaurus and write dialog that sings, instead of slangs, but there was only one Noel Coward. His works is still worth experiencing.
Costa Mesa Playhouse has an excellent website with prompt ticketing applications. Future productions include "Earthlings Beware!"; "Nunsense"; "The Crucible"; "Hedwig & the Angry Inch". Ticket prices are modest, discounts for students and seniors. Learn more at http://www.costamesaplayhouse.org
Costa Mesa Playhouse
661 Hamilton St.
Costa Mesa, CA92627
949-650-5269
Angela Rocco DeCarlo copyright, 2011
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