Trevor Nunn's new production of Noël Coward's early play Easy Virtue has opened at the Arts Theatre in Cambridge, offering a luxurious take on the 1920s divorce dramedy. The play, which helped launch Coward to stardom at age 25, explores marital uncoupling and social taboos with wit and psychological depth.
Simon Higlett's sumptuous drawing-room set features a marble staircase for dramatic entrances and exits, while the 1920s costumes include elaborate finger waves. Greta Scacchi stars as the horrified matriarch who discovers her son has married a divorcee, while Alice Orr-Ewing plays Larita, the modern heroine who arrives with cool self-possession, sunglasses propped on her head and scarf trailing.
Larita emerges as a stifled yet defiant figure, battling patronising and vengeful in-laws. Her declaration 'My life is my own' echoes Ibsen, and a magnificent centrepiece monologue showcases Coward's emotional insight. The large cast includes Michael Praed as a surprisingly liberal father-in-law and a thoughtful ex-girlfriend who helps explore marriage's 'hideously intimate relationship'.
While the comedy around the 'D-word' may not land as sharply today, the play's psychological honesty and pathos remain timeless. Coward's repartee serves not just to puncture hypocrisy but to mask heartbreak, as when Larita admits: 'Women of my type are so tiresome in love. We hammer at it, tooth and nail, until it's all bent and misshapen.' The production reveals Coward's scorching emotional insight, foreshadowing his later masterpiece Private Lives.
