Present Laughter Preps Broadway Opening Night

Broadway is a funnier place with the arrival of Noel Coward's comedy Present Laughter. Last season, Coward's Blithe Spirit charmed and helped Angela Lansbury to win another Tony Award. This season Victor Garber stars in a Coward comedy that is sure to amuse, as the play is one of the famed British playwrights most mischievously honest about the life of a star. The production opens on January 21, and is currently in previews. Enjoy these Joan Marcus photos of Mr. Garber as Garry Essendine.

Directed by Nicholas Martin, the cast also includes Harriet Harris (Monica Reed), Brooks Ashmanskas (Roland Maule), Lisa Banes (Liz Essendine), Nancy E. Carroll (Miss Erickson), Alice Duffy (Lady Saltburn), Holley Fain(Daphne Stillington), Pamela Jane Gray (Joanna Lypiatt), James Joseph O'Neil (Fred), Richard Poe (Henry Lypiatt), Marc Vietor (Morris Dixon).

The play takes its title from Shakespeare's Feste in Twelfth Night who sings :

"What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty,—
Then come kiss me, Sweet and twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure."