Tonight at 8.30

For the related 1952 film released in the US as Tonight at 8:30, see Meet Me Tonight.

Lawrence and Coward in the Broadway production

Tonight at 8.30[n 1] is a cycle of ten one-act plays by Noël Coward, presented in London in 1936 and in New York in 1936–1937, with the author and Gertrude Lawrence in the leading roles. The plays are mostly comedies, but three, The Astonished Heart, Shadow Play and Still Life, are serious. Four of the comedies include songs, with words and music by Coward.

One play, Star Chamber, was dropped after a single performance. The other nine plays were presented in three programmes of three plays each. There have been numerous revivals of many of the individual plays, but revivals of the complete cycle have been much less frequent. Several of the plays have been adapted for the cinema and television.

Tonight at 8.30 was first presented in 1935 in Manchester and then on tour in six other British cities, before opening in London and New York the following year.[n 2]

  1. ^ "To-night at 8.30", The Times, 20 August 1935, p. 10
  2. ^ Coward, 1954, pp. xvii and 99
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference dvii was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference m282 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).


Cite error: There are <ref group=n> tags on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=n}} template (see the help page).