Drama and Contemporary Society

Present Laughter’s inner core of characters, grouped around a successful actor of Coward’s age, reflects Coward’s own circumstances, with two younger characters, outsiders, presenting challenges respectively in the areas of sexual and professional relations. A comedy of manners. This Happy Breed, with lower middle class protagonists, covers the inter-war years and comes out with a statement against appeasement. Peace in Our Time, his fourth play about Britain, is set in a wartime London occupied as Paris was by the Germans. A play of physical violence, and ’30 s movements of pacifism, communism and fascism are pilloried. The Resistance (c.f. Sartre) encapsulates what is best in Britain. Blithe Spirit, with Coward’s greatest comic character, Madam Arcati, is a comedy of excellent construction. Much of the comedy derives from juxtapositions of spiritualist claptrap and the problems (more familiar to theatre audiences) of a triangle comprising a man and two wives locked in rivalry.