Showing @ Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh until Sat 08 Mar @ 19:45

Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor had been married and divorced twice before they famously revived Noël Coward’s Private Lives in 1983. The play was seen to mirror the golden couple’s own turbulent relationship, much to audiences delight. It’s a play that is often cast with older, more experienced actors, despite its creator writing it when he was just 30. Martin Duncan’s revival of Coward’s 1930 comedy of manners takes the characters back to a younger incarnation, giving the play a playful, flippant tone.

It’s been five years since Elyot (John Hopkins) and Amanda (Kirsty Besterman) divorced, and both now meet on the adjacent balconies of a luxurious hotel while honeymooning with their new spouses. It’s not long before “cheap” music and cocktails reignite the passion between them and they take off for Paris together.

The three act play, divided by 2 intervals, could be a three-episode sitcom. The obnoxious, arrogant and totally charming characters are detestably seductive and the physical comedy compliments Coward’s bawdy and brazen wit. Francis O’Connor’s lavish 30s set shows off the wealthy and indulgent world the characters revolve in. As they destroy the material world around them, their disregard for rules and social acceptance become clear: Amanda and Elyot are so passionately in love (and simultaneously hate) that they exist within their own world, to the extent that they fail to – and don’t care about – functioning in the real world.

In the first act, Amanda’s observation makes the point: ‘I think very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives.’ It’s an energy that comes with youth and a certain naivety; the audience are merely voyeurs, there to laugh at them but also to envy the undeniable chemistry that makes them belong so wholly to each other. For that reason, it’s hard not to crave the satisfaction of a happy ending. And you won’t be disappointed.