The Importance of Being Earnest

The Importance of Being Earnest
By Oscar Wilde. Canberra Repertory. Directed by Judi Crane. Theatre 3, Acton. 20 February – 7 March 2015

How must a man win a woman whose romantic feelings depend upon his name?  And how will his love triumph over his best friend’s determination to thwart him?

The Importance of Being Earnest’s plot is essentially timeless, the convolutions of its deceits playing a great part of its eternal charm.  A young gentleman’s audacity in posing as his best friend’s fictitious dissipated younger brother in order to meet his friend’s young ward; the friend’s turning that against him; the misinterpretations of them both by the objects of their affections: the comedy inherent in these timeless tactics remains as fresh in this performance as it has ever been, the coincidences being as amusing as unlikely.

But the delights that infuse Earnest depend less on being unfamiliar with its comedic turns than on appreciation, by cast and audience, of the linguistic play with which Wilde infuses it throughout and of the universal language in which the body can have a line mean its opposite, as occurred to great effect in this production. 

Canberra Repertory’s cast has infused the lines with new life in this production, downplaying the crankiness and hidden beneficence of the nonetheless convincing Lady Bracknell, highlighting more the character of the fictitious younger brother, Jack, and directing the spotlight on fresh comedic connotations.  John Brennan, as the real Jack (who calls himself Ernest in town), played a good straight man to Miles Thompson, playing Algernon (who becomes Jack in the country) with an always entertaining insouciance.

The makeup and highly authentic costuming so transformed Jordan Best, Jessica Symonds, and Kayleigh Brewster into, respectively, the stout but slightly nervous character of Miss Prism, the modest but firm character of Cecily, and an even firmer Gwendolen that you wouldn't have recognised any of them.

Each character came to life with consistent English understatedness.  But especially delightful was Michael Miller’s performance as the silently scathing Merriman, whose eyebrows alone could have won awards in this performance for their acting.

The set, though simple, was adaptable and interesting; and costuming was, as ever in Rep productions, perfect for the characters, leaving nothing to chance.

Offering priceless wisdom about the value of fiction over that of truth, this is an evening’s worth of laughs for young and old.  As an introduction to mock-serious theatre, it would be hard to beat.

John P. Harvey

Images: [L–R] Kayleigh Brewster, Miles Thompson, Jessica Symonds, and Karen Vickery, &   [L–R] John Brennan and Miles Thompson, in The Importance of Being Earnest.  Photographer: Ross Gould.

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