A classic Alan Ayckbourn tragi-comedy from the 1970s, last revived in the West End ten years ago. Provoking laughter and tears in equal measure, the play explores the innocent destructiveness of the happily well-intentioned. Colin's friends want to help. He has been absent from their lives for a while, but the death of his fiancée, whom they have never met, has propelled Diana into organising a consolatory tea party. Ayckbourn is the master at laying bare human nature and in Absent Friends he explores the universal and unchanging themes of our embarrassment in the face of death, the despair of lives unfulfilled and marriages that have stalled. Produced & Directed by Claire Evans