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London Suite

Full-Length Play, Comedy  /  3w, 3m

Neil Simon’s delightful comedy consists of four vignettes, each taking place in the same suite in a posh Hyde Park hotel.

  • Cast Size
    Cast Size
    3w, 3m
  • Duration
    Duration
    More than 120 minutes (2 hours)
  • SubGenre
    Subgenre
    Adaptation (Stage & Screen)
Accolades
Accolades
  • Nominee: 1995 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Play

Details

Summary

America's premier comic playwright crosses the Atlantic for a suite of hilarious comedies set in a deluxe London hotel – a sedate place until these characters check in.

In Settling Accounts, the suite is occupied by an inebriated Welsh writer who is holding his long time business manager, caught absconding with the writer's money, at gunpoint. The villain concocts increasingly farfetched explanations of what he was doing at Heathrow with the cash.

In Going Home, an American widow and her daughter, visiting England to buy shoes, take over the suite. At the daughter’s insistence, mother spends her last evening in London with a rich Scotsman.

The hotel guests in The Man on the Floor are a married couple from New York who have lost their tickets to Wimbledon and are about to lose their suite to Kevin Costner – who absolutely must have it now.

The evening ends on a funny, bittersweet note with Diana and Sidney, two characters introduced in California Suite. Diana, the Oscar-winning actress, and Sidney, her bisexual husband, are now divorced and are seeing each other for the first time in years. He needs money for his lover who is dying of cancer. The money is not a problem for Diana, but the realization that she still loves Sidney is.

History

London Suite premiered off-Broadway at the Union Square Theatre on 28 March 1995. Directed by Daniel Sullivan, the production featured Brooks Ashmanskas, Kate Burton, Jeffrey Jones, Carole Shelley and Paxton Whitehead.

Act I

“Settling Accounts”
BRIAN
BILLY

“Going Home”
LAUREN
MRS. SEMPLE

Act II

“Diana & Sidney”
DIANA
GRACE
SIDNEY

“The Man on the Floor”
MARK
ANNIE
MRS. SITGOOD
BELLMAN
DR. McMERLIN

The original off-Broadway production featured five actors (2 women and 3 men).

  • Setting

    A suite at a posh Hyde Park hotel. 1996. 

  • Duration More than 120 minutes (2 hours)

Media

“You’ll leave this bright comedy with a smile on your face.” – NBC TV

“Makes laughter easy!” – The New York Times

“Booked solid with merciful laughter.” – Newark Star-Ledger

Licensing & Materials

  • Minimum Fee: £70 per performance plus VAT when applicable.

    Please submit a license request to determine availability.

Authors

Neil Simon

American playwright and screenwriter Neil Simon (1927-2018) is widely regarded as one of the most successful, prolific and performed playwrights in theatre history. In addition to Lost In Yonkers, which won a Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize, his plays and musicals include Come ...

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