Samuel West

If Noel Coward's Present Laughter is, as generally agreed, drawn from his own life, he goes beyond self-portrait and self-caricature into unflinching self-laceration.

Pier Productions' new radio version, directed by Celia de Wolff, is a smart romp through the farcical life of preening matinee idol Garry Essendine as those who wish to seduce, serve, berate or befriend him whirl in and out of his flat or hide in adjoining rooms.

Garry is both compliant in and despairing of the louche behaviour and professional neediness he inspires, and Samuel West bridges this schizoid gap with a muscular performance in the role.

It seems that Garry has to be impressed and depressed by successive visitors before he can relinquish his camp, actorly demeanour. It is all very funny, especially when he is paired with his long-time secretary Monica, played with wonderful acidity by Frances Barber.

Preparing for a tour of Africa, Garry swoons at imagined ailments. "I can see myself under a mosquito net fighting for breath," he moans.

"Who with?" retorts Monica, with cut-throat timing.

As Garry's estranged wife Liz, Janie Dee exercises steely control with a hint of motherliness, which is no doubt why he dumps the wannabes and creeps off with her. Despite the posturing and the silk robes, Garry has his own uncertainties, brought on by the horror of his 40th birthday, which West evokes with subtle vocal undertones.

Garry is savage, however, when eviscerating the work of a young playwright (Freddie Fox) and the odd recital style of would-be actress Daphne (Lily James), who pronounces 'singled' as 'sing-led' to his amusement, following that up with''ming-led' to more mocking.

A recently discovered Noel Coward play, The Better Half, written when he was only 22, was an astonishingly mature account of the way a couple connived to kill their marriage. Working from Coward's unpublished manuscript, Martin Jarvis drew crisp performances from Federay Holmes, Lisa Dillon and Samuel West.

An intriguing Noel Coward playlet, never before performed in public as the Lord Chamberlain refused it a licence because of its racy theme. Alice (Federay Holmes) has been married to David (Samuel West) for six years yet she's not satisfied. "Maybe one desires something more than straightness, honesty and good looks," she tells her friend Marion (Lisa Dillon), before recommending Marion have an affair with David. Alice isn't in love with anyone else, just bored by David's reliability. And Marion confesses she's in love with him. What next?

Noel Coward's 1922 play was considered too racy for public consumption at the time, and was only rediscovered by researches in the British Library in 2007. Samuel West is David, in an unhappy marriage to Alice (Federay Holmes), who tries to persuade him to have an affair with her best friend Marion (Lisa Dillon). A curio rather than a masterpiece, it nevertheless contains some typical Coward dialogue.

This one-act play by Noel Coward was thought to be lost, but was rediscovered in a collection of plays in the British library in 2007. It's by no means a masterpiece and some of the issues it covers are horribly outdated - a wife-beater shows he still loves his spouse, for he would not hit her if he did not care - but it does make up for this with deliciously wicked one-liners from Alice, the bored wife who wants to escape her loveless marriage. Federay Holmes obviously enjoyed playing Alice, while Samuel West and Lisa Dillon make the perfect worthy-but-dull husband and girlfriend.