Tonight at 8.30

Written as a vehicle for Coward’s own acting talents alongside his frequent stage partner Gertrude Lawrence, Tonight at 8:30 is Coward’s ambitious series of ten one-act plays which saw him breathe new life into the one-act form. From vaudeville to satire, from farce to intricate comedy of manners, from melodrama to romance, these plays span the full, glorious range of Coward’s writing. Peep through your fingers at the chaotic Red Peppers music-hall show, witness a bankrupt couple use all Ways and Means to scheme their way out of debt, and break your heart along with Laura in the famous Still Life, the original version of the film Brief Encounter. First performed in London in 1936, the plays perfectly showcase Coward's talents as a playwright, providing a sparkling, fast-paced and remarkably varied selection of theatrical gems. Coward wrote of the first series of three plays with characteristic delight: ‘They are all brilliantly written, exquisitely directed, and I am bewitching in all of them.’ Gertrude Lawrence wrote to Coward in 1947, ‘Dearest Noël, wherever I go . . . all I hear is "please revive Tonight at 8.30!"' All ten plays are collected together into this volume that features both Coward’s own preface and an introduction by Barry Day, Coward expert and editor of The Letters of Noël Coward. This new edition of Tonight at 8.30 is published to coincide with English Touring Theatre and the Nuffield Southampton's revival for the first time in the UK since Coward starred in them in 1936.