We’re into the summer silly season in the West End, which accounts for the arrival of the Bunbury Company of Players, reviving for the umpteenth time their acclaimed — by the Morton St Cuthbert Gazette — 1970 production of Oscar Wilde’s masterpiece. This fictional company, whom we join at their final dress rehearsal, is actually the front for a group of thesps of a certain age to play roles that should by rights be assumed by actors many years their junior.
It’s a jolly jape — there are amusing issues with the cucumber sandwiches and the costumes to start off with — but one that gets rather creaky over two hours’ playing time. The conceit could usefully be pushed further into Noises Off territory, to give us more of the backstage battles. As it is, it trails off, although the am-dram cover is, intentionally or not, a handy excuse for some wooden acting in Lucy Bailey’s production. What this age-shift actually adds to our deeper understanding of the play, though, is hard to discern.
Nigel Havers and Martin Jarvis play those two young cads about town, Algernon Moncrieff and Jack Worthing, roles they took more age-appropriately for Peter Hall at the National in 1982. They’re good value as they woo their respective ladies through fair means and foul, and Havers still has a devilish twinkle in his eye. They spar vigorously with Siân Phillips’s mighty Lady Bracknell, who ticks off Wilde’s wicked witticisms with élan before stowing them loftily in her handbag.
Until Sept 20 (0844 871 7622, EarnestThePlay.co.uk)
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