25-28 March 2015
This was the second time the Society had performed Noël Coward’s tale of an ordinary South London family between the two world wars. Our first production was in 1947 when the play was relatively new. More serious than his usual work, This Happy Breed examined what it meant to be British, seen from the perspective of the aspiring working class from which Coward himself came, in the waning days of Empire.

As with the earlier Carrington VC, the production was done in the round as a way of creating intimacy, this time with the audience seated on two sides of the hall and on the stage, with the action taking place along the length of the hall.  On one night the intimacy became too much, with one audience member patting Judy Ives on the arm and murmuring, “I know how you feel.”

Meanwhile the Society was building up for its next Edinburgh jaunt, with fundraising activities posted on the programme’s back page.