"Hoping for a quiet weekend in the country with some guests, David Bliss, a novelist, and his wife, Judith, a retired actress, find quite an impossible dream when their high-spirited children, Simon and Sorel, appear with guests of their own. A houseful of drama waits to be ignited as misunderstandings and tempers flare in this classic farce."
A restful summer weekend in England. Ah, such Bliss!
Except at the Bliss' house. Here, a weekend is all but restful. When this odd family has houseguests, it's chaos, particularly for the poor houseguests.
One has to love British wit. We certainly do at 3rd Act!
This will be my third season of directing classic British comedy. In this world there are kings. Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, and now Noel Coward.
Coward wrote this play specifically for his actor friends to have fun with the characters, and what characters they are.
In typical British fashion, Coward roasts the upper class and lets us watch. No pie in the face, no banana peels. It's all in the words, the wit, and the characters. John Cleese once said that "it is the aim of every British person to die having never been embarrassed." The Bliss family clings with tenacity to this profound truth! Not that they shouldn't be embarrassed, they just aren't. Now, enjoy your evening with our cousins across the pond, and do try to keep up.
~Don Taylor
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