Oscar Wilde's Victorian comedy of manners is a perfect play for the picturesque setting of Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, not least because it has the bygone feel of a summer evening on a country estate where picnics on the lawn and outdoor entertainment over a splash of Chateauneuf-du-Pape were simply de rigueur. The Importance of Being Earnest with its wonderful upper-crust nonsense and absurdly lovable characters is just an extension of this world; one where the whims and follies of the upper classes fritter the time away. Ernest is the alter ego of Jack who assumes this rakish persona when he visits London; he wants to marry Gwendolen, the cousin of his best friend Algernon, but Gwendolen thinks Jack to be Ernest and Algernon also pretends to be Ernest to woo Jack's pretty niece Cecily. And let's not forget the formidable Lady Bracknell, Gwendolen's mother, in the midst of this fluster. There really are some delicious lines - Lady B's exclamation of "A handbag?" is one of the more famous in a play that delights in snobbery and satire.
(Image: Alastair Muir)
What's on at
Open Air Theatre, Regent's Park
Open Air Theatre 24th May 2010 - 11th September 2010 This is the 78th season for The Regent's Park Open...
£10-£42 (Mon to Thu and Sat mats), £18-£45 (Fri & Sat), £20 (Under 18s), £15 (OAPs weekday mats in advance), £10/£18 (Disabled & one companion), £12.50 (Standbys for concs)
London Location Map of The Importance Of Being Earnest
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Park Office,
Storeyard ( Inner Circle),Marylebone,
London,
NW1Map
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Oscar Wilde's Victorian comedy of manners is a perfect play for the picturesque setting of 
