by Edwin Preece - director Ralph Wigg - click to enlarge
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Edwin's comedy charts the progress of the three days of a family Christmas; the family is headed by a clipboard-toting ex-military martinet, but he's not always in control, and the twists and turns in the involved relationships within the circle of friends and family keep the audience laughing and guessing right until the end.
A group of three couples, old friends and all married on the same day in the same chapel, gathers at the Helliwells' home to celebrate their silver anniversary. J. B. Priestley was always haunted by the smugness and hypocrisy of the Edwardian middle classes. In An Inspector Calls he treated the subject polemically. In this earlier play, written in 1938, he tackles it comically.