Blithe Spirit
Noël Coward
In this improbable farce, novelist Charles Condomine invites a medium, Madame Arcati, to his home to conduct a séance for research. The plan backfires spectacularly when she accidentally summons the ghost of his temperamental first wife, Elvira. Visible only to Charles, Elvira proceeds to sabotage his current marriage to the increasingly frustrated Ruth. The play is a brilliant, macabre comedy about the persistence of past relationships and the literal haunting of a marriage. It was written in just five days during the Blitz and provided much-needed escapism for war-torn London audiences, becoming a record-breaking West End hit.
Charles Condomine: A sophisticated, slightly pedantic novelist who becomes the harried victim of a domestic tug-of-war between his living wife and his persistent, ghostly ex-wife. Elvira: Charles's late first wife—a mischievous, ethereal, and possessive spirit who returns to the mortal world with the sole intention of disrupting his current marriage. Madame Arcati: An eccentric, bicycling medium whose genuine but unpredictable supernatural powers set the play's chaotic events in motion with professional enthusiasm and odd rituals.
First Performance: 1941, at Piccadilly Theatre, London
Massive success; its long run during World War II provided essential morale-boosting laughter for Londoners.
Original Actors: Cecil Parker, Kay Hammond, Margaret Rutherford