For audiences who didn’t get their fill of Noël Coward with the recent Ross Valley Players production of Blithe Spirit, the Novato Theater Company is offering a second helping of Coward comedy with their production of Present Laughter. The show runs in Novato through February 16. 

But Coward purists beware. Audiences expecting a traditional production of the 1940’s three-act farce may be taken aback as director Carl Jordan leans into a revival version mounted in 2019 that made significant changes to some of the characters. 

While the core of Coward is still there (even with the original three acts reduced to two), Jordan moves the period piece into the present, adds bits of awkward choreography and topical references, and utilizes a modern soundtrack to highlight moments or cover scene changes (I really could have done without hearing Toto’s “Africa” in a Noël Coward show.)

Most jarringly, the revival version converted – for lack of a better word – some of the various conflict-creating heterosexual couplings that go on in the show to same-sex ones. What in Coward’s original was a wife cheating on her husband becomes a husband cheating on his wife… with a man. 

That man would be actor Garry Essendine (David Abrams), England’s leading stage star who is facing down middle age while looking up to an African tour. The tour can’t begin soon enough as Gary finds himself having to deal with a one-night stand (Tina Traboulsi), a very strange aspiring playwright (Thomas Petersen), his philandering manager (Kevin Allen), his producer (Ashey Kennedy), and her philandering husband (Nic Moore).

This is all under the watchful and somewhat amused eyes of his estranged wife (Kathryn Schott), his housekeeper (Shirley Nilsen Hall), his valet (Jamie Montellato) and his secretary (Heather Shepardson).

Abrams gives a full-throated performance as the vainglorious Garry. The character is clearly written as an old-school, ego-inflated matinee idol and Abrams plays it for all its worth, which is why it seems so out of place in the present day.

He’s given terrific support by the ensemble, particularly Traboulsi as a seemingly ditzy groupie who proves to be quite steely. Hall, Montellato, and Shepardson are the bedrock of the show as his frequently put-upon staff.

The beautiful art deco set design by Electric Bill Weinberg (which seems to be based on/inspired by Rob Howell’s design for the 2019 British revival) and lighting by Frank Sarubbi also harken back to the show’s original period, and several script specifics play anachronistically. Who travels in steerage these days?

There’s a lot of good work done here, but they’re all battling against a director’s flawed vision.

Bottom line – Even with the changes in characters’ orientations, this Present would have played better in the past.

‘Present Laughter’ runs through February 16 at the Novato Theater Company, 5420 Nave Drive, Ste. C, Novato. Fri & Sat, 7:30pm; Sun, 2pm., $25–$35. 415.883.4498. novatotheatercompany.org.

Photos by Jere Torkelson

This review originally appeared in an edited version in the Pacific Sun.