A Marvelous Party: The Noel Coward Celebration at Northlight Theatre

Chicago Tribune - Recommended

"...if you want nothing more than to see Coward's best music carefully chosen and superbly performed with genuine sophistication and artistry, "A Marvelous Party" most assuredly delivers. This diverse material was specially selected for the talents of this cast, and it shows."

Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended

"...It is worth the price of admission alone to see her in "The Coconut Girl," the first act's "piece de resistance" -- an extended parody sequence in which she plays a chorus girl in a hit West End musical who re-enacts the entire show and, in the process, reveals her own abundant gifts. Lauris seemed capable and likable enough up until that point; but by the time the "Coconut" split she proved that some new incarnation of the legendary vaudeville comedian Fanny Brice had arrived. And, of course, Coward's gift for showbiz satire remains matchless."

Chicago Reader - Not Recommended

"...A coproduction with Geva Theatre Center in Rochester, New York, A Marvelous Party offers only disconnected epigrams and a pastiche of 30s tuxedo-movie moments involving elegant tipsiness (The Thin Man) and sinuous dancing (Flying Down to Rio). In David Ira Goldstein's staging, Lauris, Carl Danielsen, and Mark Anders try to conceal the material's weakness by mugging and indulging in overdone English accents."

Time Out Chicago - Not Recommended

"...As interpreted here, with a polite style so unobjectionable it induces objection, Coward's ditties seem wholly bound by their era, unable to transcend it. While unengaged by the songs, we're given time to ponder other things, like why American theater holds on so tenaciously to this dated brand of phony Englishness."

ChicagoCritic - Highly Recommended

"...This is tremendous entertainment. Come taste the world of Noel Coward, it’ll leave you sharply satisfied. He redefined style and this gem gives us a sampler of true style. Coward would be in his glory with this show."