Blithe Spirit
Photo: Nobby Clark
Madeleine Mantcock will make her West End debut to play Elvira to complete the cast of the upcoming West End production of Blithe Spirit starring Jennifer Saunders. Madeleine recently played ‘Macy Vaughn’; a series lead in Charmed for CBS Studios and ‘Miss Clara’, in the BBC adaptation of Andrea Levy’s novel The Long Song. Other TV credits include: Casualty, The Tomorrow People, Age Before Beauty and Into the Badlands. Films include: Edge of Tomorrow with Tom Cruise, Breaking Brooklyn and The Truth Commissioner.
Jennifer Saunders, one of the UK’s most popular comic actors, will revive her role as the preposterous clairvoyant Madame Arcati. She is joined by original cast members Geoffrey Streatfeild who will star as Charles Condomine, Lisa Dillon as Ruth Condomine, Simon Coates as Dr Bradman, Lucy Robinson as Mrs Bradman, and Rose Wardlaw as Edith. The production brings together a distinguished and multi-award-winning creative team, directed by former National Theatre director Sir Richard Eyre with design by Anthony Ward, lighting by Howard Harrison, sound by John Leonard and illusions by Paul Kieve.
Written in 1941, Coward’s inventive, witty and meticulously engineered comedy proved light relief and a popular distraction at the height of World War II when it was first staged. The show had a record-breaking run in the West End and on Broadway and remains one of the playwright’s most popular works.
Novelist Charles Condomine and his second wife Ruth are literally haunted by a past relationship when an eccentric medium inadvertently conjures up the ghost of his first wife, Elvira, at a séance. When she appears, visible only to Charles, and determined to sabotage his current marriage, life – and the afterlife – get complicated.
Noël Coward was an English playwright, composer, actor, producer and director. His dramas include Hay Fever and Private Lives. For film, he wrote and directed the Academy Award-winning In Which We Serve and the screenplay for Brief Encounter.
Jennifer Saunders is well known as one half of the comedy duo French and Saunders, for which she and Dawn French received a BAFTA fellowship in 2009, and for the hit comedy series and subsequent film, Absolutely Fabulous, which she also wrote and starred in. She has received numerous awards including two Emmys, five BAFTAs and four British Comedy Awards.
Sir Richard Eyre was at the helm of the National Theatre for 10 years and is the winner of five Olivier Awards including a Lifetime Achievement Award. His numerous hugely-acclaimed productions include Guys and Dolls, The Invention of Love and Private Lives. His award-winning film and television work includes Iris, Tumbledown and The Children Act.
Blithe Spirit is presented by Theatre Royal Bath Productions, Lee Dean and Jonathan Church Theatre Productions. The show had a sell-out run at Theatre Royal Bath as part of its 2019 Summer season, a UK tour and a short run of just 12 performances before the country’s first lockdown curtailed its six week run at the Duke of York’s Theatre in March 2020.