Will history come full circle? Or can one generation learn from their parents' mistakes?

Jane Asher (Alfie, Deep End) plays Lady Kitty, a society beauty who notoriously abandoned her stuffy husband Clive (Clive Francis, The Crown), and eloped with the handsome Lord Porteous (Nicholas Le Prevost, Shakespeare in Love, Testament of Youth).

Thirty years later, love's young dream has descended into non-stop squabbling... Meanwhile Clive and Lady Kitty's son Arnold faces the same marital fate as his wife Elizabeth threatens to elope with the dashing Teddie Luton.

Somerset Maugham's sparky comedy of manners was first staged in 1921 and has remained a firm favourite with audiences ever since. Maugham was among the most successful novelists and playwrights of the inter-war years. Many of his novels, including The Painted Veil, Theatre, Up At The Villa and Of Human Bondage have been adapted for the screen.