Love in Idleness Tickets

You adore quality theatre. Here's a classic for you in the shape of Trevor Nunn's exceptional production of Love In Idleness. Nunn directs an all-star cast including Eve Best as Olivia Brown, star of TV's Stan Lee's Lucky Man and an extremely talented actress. Edward Bluemel plays Michael Brown and Anthony Head Sir John Fletcher, the set and costumes are by Stephen Brimson Lewis, the lighting design comes from Paul Pyant and the sound from Gregory Clarke. It's a Chocolate Factory Productions and Nica Burns production, and it's designed to delight.

What's the plot? When a young man with radical left wing political views returns home from Canada, he's horrified to discover that his mother is seeing a rich married businessman, Sir John Fletcher, serving as government Minister for Tank Production and playing a starring role in Churchill's War Cabinet. She is understandably torn between her lover and her son, who is furious about the relationship. The result is funny, absurd, breathtakingly cynical and wonderfully complex.

So far, so simple. But this production comes with a cool quirk – it's actually a blend of Love In Idleness and Less Than Kind, which was the play's original iteration. Why? It's a fascinating story. Less Than Kind was revised several times by the playwright through the latter half of 1944, eventually renaming it Love in Idleness, a version that was watered down thanks to demands by the starring husband and wife actors Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne. Trevor Nunn has merged the two versions to brilliant effect, revealing the playwright's famously divided personality.

Eve Best has already enjoyed huge praise for her role as the devoted mother Olivia, played with a remarkably creative blend of passion and snobbery, and the results are often very funny indeed. Edward Bluemel is a sulky, moody and magnificent. Anthony Head plays the iron-willed Sir John perfectly, and Helen George's portrayal of Sir John's flighty wife is a delight.

The play makes highly creative use of old newsreel footage, revealing the deprivations of wartime but also showcasing the optimism that fell out of the Beveridge report's idealistic vision of social security for every member of the nation. If you enjoy a potent combination of pleasure, laughter and pain, this one is tailor made for you: intelligent, perceptive, and absolutely beautifully done.