It's not every day you get to see something on Broadway that you could recite from end to end. Noel Coward's "Blithe Spirit" was part of my brief, fleeting career in high school drama (fun fact: I understudied regular commenter Elizabeth) and it all came rushing back last weekend when I saw Rupert Everett, Christine Ebersole and Angela Lansbury perform in it on Broadway last weekend. If I was laughing at slightly different moments than the rest of the audience -- well, that's old age for you.
"Blithe Spirit" is a fun play, but I wouldn't put it up there with my favorites. (Not even sure where my scrawled-over copy is at this point, although I'm sure I kept it.) The small collection of plays I own are the ones I read over and over without them losing their resonance. Some sparked my interest when I first read them, like when I was assigned Lorca's "As Five Years Pass"; others, like "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," I found after seeing a particularly memorable performance. ("Cat" was my go-to book one summer to such an extent that if anyone else picked up my copy it would probably burst into flames.)
If you have a favorite play, how did you find it?
21 hours ago
