In the following essay, Connolly provides an overview and brief history of Coward's play.

The Bliss family has invited four intimate friends down to their place in Cookham, meaning to seduce their guests. However the Blisses end up abandoning them. The Blisses live in their own world, a realm which has precious little to do with external reality and the visitors to it are so completely bewildered that they end up seriously pondering whether they actually will be served tea at "tea-time ". Driven to starvation by their hosts' indifference and to distraction by their antics the guests unceremoniously depart. "How very rude!" exclaims Mrs. Bliss on hearing that they have done so.

Nothing is supposed to happen over a weekend and in this play Coward takes this social dictum to absurdly comic levels. A retired actress, Judith Bliss, will have absolutely nothing to do with the care...