The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde’s splendid comedy of manners, never fails to entertain the crowds - even students coerced into the stalls as part of their exams’ syllabus.
It’s one of the writer’s most quotable plays, every line a gem, and so recognisable by audiences that they are chuckling before the dialogue is spoken.
The latest production, from London Classic Theatre (who last staged the tremendous Equus at The Grove), flew into the Dunstable venue for a one show last night. Although slow to find its feet there was soon the familiar laughs and guffaws from theatre-goers as the cast got into their stride.
Wilde has often been derided by academics and critics for writing lightweight trivia but Earnest is a masterclass in invention and endurance. His dialogue is probably the most recognisable of any popular play ever written. That surely must be the mark of a genius.
The farce has a convoluted plot about two bachelors about town who adopt different identities so as to indulge themselves with the ladies. It’s full of social pretensions of the day and is famed for giving theatre one of its original “Gorgons” - the quite terrifying Lady Bracknell whose snobbery knows no bounds.
Earnest is all about identity and the class system of the day. Lady B is very particular about who will squire her only daughter. She delivers probably the most memorable two words in dramatic history (“a handbag?!”) when she discovers that a potential suitor, Earnest Worthing, has no antecedents other than the certain knowledge that he appears to have been born in a travelling bag at a railway terminus.
It’s pure Victorian froth but wonderfully served up.
Carmen Rodriguez made for a handsome Lady B, producing a grande dame who was superbly arch. The diminutive Paul Sandys (as Earnest) was positively vaporised in her presence and left most of the acting to his eyebrows which seemingly took on a role of their own throughout the show.
But Richard Stemp was determined to steal the show as both Lane and Merriman, manservants to Earnest and his alter ego, Jack. As Lane he was the epitome of a gentleman’s gentleman. As the rural Merriman he hovered about in almost every scene, grimacing and reacting and taking the attention away from the rest of the cast.
He was a hoot - but I was baffled by his accent which was more rustic Herefordshire, and produced just to get laughs, than refined Hertfordshire which was where Jack’s country house was located.
A not so trivial comedy for serious people.