There is more to a Noël Coward play than polished permawit and devastating diction. But, never mind the subtexts, it needs relish. And this revival by the director Nikolai Foster has everything but the spark of vitality that could make this Cowardly artifice come alive. It looks good. Nobody gives a bad performance, exactly. But it’s like a party full of interesting guests in which everybody cancels each other out.

That sort of miscommunication, of course, is the point of the play, which was Coward’s first big hit in 1925. The Bliss family, headed by Diana Rigg as the grand actress Judith, have settled in the country to commune with their own egos. Over the course of a weekend they each invite potential paramours to stay. And each ends up snubbing his or her own guest and tangling with another, before ending the non-affair with a display of bravado.

Rigg gives a sensitive, psychologically true performance as Judith. She’s charming but weary. Yet is a sensitive, psychologically true performance enough? Judith needs to perform, and we want to watch her doing so. If it’s all just a bit polite, it’s never less than pleasant. Edward Bennett, last seen deputising for David Tennant in Hamlet, gives an amusing Tim Nice-But-Dim sheen to Sandy, Judith’s toyboy. Laura Rogers, as the daughter Sorel, and Simon Williams, as the husband David, have energy and accuracy. Guy Henry’s despairing diplomat Richard has a wonderful faraway look as his weekend crumbles. And Caroline Langrishe’s Myra, who “uses sex like some sort of shrimping net”, radiates her sense of sensual entitlement.

However, if this were a game of tennis, the rallies would be short. Robert Jones’s set is a stunning re-creation of a grand Home Counties house. But the sheer amount of space the characters have to cover leaves some intimate conversations being carried out ten paces apart. It needs confinement for its characters to bust out from. What we get instead is something warm rather than feverish. Despite some effective set pieces, Foster’s production needs more friction to sell its deliberately plotless posturings.

As it is, this Bliss family stops so far short of caricature that you start to ask questions about what’s going on. Why must they take on so? Is this some sort of comment on artistic arrogance? On the social exclusivity of the upper middle classes? Is it true that Coward wrote the whole thing in three days flat? That he said it’s the hardest play to perform that he’d ever come across? And why am I thinking these irritating thoughts when I should be sitting back and enjoying the ride?

Box office: 01243 781312, to May 2.

Editor's choice

• The 100 Best Films of the Decade
• 70 facts you didn't know about Marvel
• The 50 Biggest Movies Of 2010