Marriage and the battle of the sexes takes the stage as the Driftwood Players’ present the drawing-room comedy “Blithe Spirit.”
Noel Coward took a darkly comic view of marital discord in “Blithe Spirit,” in which an ex-wife is raised from the dead to wreak havoc on her husband’s second marriage. Coward’s legendary wit and sophistication are showcased in this black comedy, which runs through April 24.
The setting is an uppercrust English country home where middle-aged writer Charles Condomine (Lantz Wagner) hosts a seance as research for his next novel. He gets more than he bargained for when a daft spiritualist named Madame Arcati (Walayn Sharples) conjures up the spirit of his dead first wife, Elvira (Lisa Branham).
Only Charles can see this meddlesome apparition, and Elvira’s presence quickly puts a serious crimp in his relationship wife No. 2, Ruth. Books fly and vases crash as Charles goes mad trying to convince Ruth that this ghost is real.
Scenic designer Ralph Eaton said staging a play in which one of the key actors is a ghost presents some technical challenges.
Eaton has a bag of stage tricks he’s developed in more than 30 years of working in theater, and his experience ranges from full-blown musicals to a staging of “Grapes of Wrath” in which he had to create an on-stage river.
For this play, he’s designed a Victorian parlor and furnished it with antiques and high-style Art Deco furniture, then wired in some special-effect tricks.
When you’ve got a peevish ghost in the house, you can expect vases to fly through the air and smash into pieces and books to pop off the shelves, and Eaton’s set is loaded with technical gizmos and gadgets to make it all happen.
Walter Baker directs.
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