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Ways and Means presented by Lunchbox Theatre
Lunchbox Theatre
Monday, September 20 - Saturday, October 9

More in: Theatre

Lunchbox Theatre’s season opener, Ways and Means, by Noel Coward, was first produced in 1936. Despite the best efforts of the cast and the director, Pamela Halstead, it shows its 74 years.

Ways and Means features the Cartwrights — Stella (Vanessa Holmes) and Toby (Rylan Wilkie) — a couple who are living way beyond their means. While on vacation in the French Riviera, Toby loses another 50 British pounds of their rapidly extinguishing funds at the casino. They have to face the fact that they are broke and owe large sums of money which they can’t possibly repay. With no money and huge debts, yet not wanting to lose face in front of their fellow socialites, Stella and Toby debate and fret over their next move.

Hawking a bracelet with the help of their kindly servant, Nanny (Clarice Evans), and then trying their luck once again in the casino, is one solution. But another character, disgraced chauffeur Stevens (Karl Sine), appears and helps them out of their predicament in an unorthodox way. I can’t say more, lest I reveal what little plot and suspense exists in this play.

For a straightforward story, with a run time of around 45 minutes, Ways and Means has a surprisingly large cast of nine, who parade in-and-out of the Cartwrights’ bedroom. — the reason for their busy bedchamber and the large cast of characters isn’t clear. In particular, Julie Orton plays Princess Elena, a kooky, though unexplained, sugar-cube-crunching Russian with a heavy accent.

The cast delivers the dialogue in a snappy fashion, all of which sounds so delightfully snooty in the actors’ crisp British dialects, developed under the tutelage of accent coach David LeReaney.

However, despite the strong cast, Ways and Means hasn’t aged well. The extravagant life Coward pokes a mildly witty finger at seems to belong to a distant past — bridge games, afternoon teas and a glamorous high society — so it’s hard to take any of the characters, or their problems, seriously. (Lunchbox tries to bridge the gap by providing an insert in the program offering present-day values for the sums of money discussed in the play. For example, Toby’s casino loses equate to $2,865.50 today, and the Cartwrights’ total debt is $361,053. The audience has a connection with the characters that’s as superficial as the lifestyle portrayed in Ways and Means.

If the story seems dated, the set thankfully does not. Style seeps out of every corner by set designer Becky Solly. The bedroom,where most of the action takes place, is beautiful and precisely decorated. The room is dressed in shades of mauve and blue, complete with a pair of feathery mules stashed neatly beside the bed, matching peacocks ornamenting each bedside table and an array of toiletry items arranged invitingly on the dresser.

Kudos are also due to costume designer Rebecca Toon. She not only outfits the women in lovely dresses, but accessorizes them with such perfect finishing touches it’s impossible not to notice, from Orton’s feather hairpiece to Olive’s (Brieanna Blizzard’s) matching jet-coloured bracelet, earrings and necklace.

Don’t go to the play expecting “uproarious” humour, as Lunchbox’s season brochure asserts. But you can expect mild amusement when, for example, Stella tells Tony the sound of his gargling as he prepares for bed comforts her, or during the requisite man-is-a-wimp scene, when Toby bumps his head and Stella tries to get him to sit still to apply iodine to the wound. (A particularly well-directed scene which partially takes place offstage with the actors’ voices wafting onto the empty set.)

Unlike some of the other Noel Coward plays I’ve seen, which admittedly aren’t many, Ways and Means doesn’t drag on too long. In fact, it ends so abruptly that you want more. Even though it doesn’t connect with the audience on any deep level, Ways and Means is still a charming, stylish little bite of Coward. I actually exited the theatre feeling slightly dejected at leaving the Cartwrights’ quaintly extravagant lifestyle behind to return to my decidedly non-stylish existence.