PREVIEW
The Importance of Being Earnest
St. Albert Catholic High Drama Dept.
March 6 and 7 at 12 p.m. and 7 p.m.
Arden Theatre
5 St. Anne Street
Tickets: $15 each or $65 for family of five. Call 780-459-7781 or at door.
One of the most beloved period satires of high school drama programs is Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest. And it’s easy to see why.
Written with sparkling wit, this silly romp is Wilde’s most famous theatrical work that lampoons the Victorian era’s hypocrisy and obsession with money, class, appearance, sexuality and marriage.
What is old continues to be new, and the St. Albert Catholic High Drama Department presents its interpretation with four shows at the Arden Theatre on March 6 and 7.
Director Debbie Dyer sees the farcical comedy’s strength as having “this ability to open up an audience’s mind by making them laugh first and think second. Oscar Wilde lived in a world of personal angst and that enabled him to write satirical reality with kernels of wisdom in it.”
Like Wilde, the play personifies Britain’s era of dandyism. Although seemingly frivolous, the play has a darker side. It reveals how society’s hypocrisies damage the people living within its constraints.
Wilde was one of those people. Shortly after the play opened, he was involved in a libel trial that led to his imprisonment as a homosexual.
“Wilde’s world defined how people belong. It was measured with sharp angles and it cut out people in many ways. He was different because his sexuality was different. He wasn’t allowed to express it.”
The plot focuses on two pairs of lovers. Jack Worthington (Nathan Kidney) is a pillar in the community and a guardian to Cecily Cardew (Athena Antinghaus). She is the pretty 18-year-old granddaughter to the late Thomas Cardew, who adopted Jack as a baby.
Jack is a major landowner with numerous tenants, farmers, servants and employees depending on him. To escape his social obligations, he invents a ne’er-do-well brother, Earnest. Jack uses Earnest’s escapades as an excuse to visit London for a reprieve.
Jack loves Gwendolen Fairfax (Gillian Callbeck/Mila Whiting), the cousin of his best friend, Algernon Moncrief (Declan Kelly). Algie, a roguish dandy, who also leads a double life, suspects Jack is up to something after finding a cigarette case addressed to Uncle Jack. Secretly paying a visit to the country, Algie meets Cecily and falls in love with her.
A jumble of mistaken identities, shifting alliances, negotiations and absurd solutions follow. Through it all, Wilde’s writing is snappy and brilliantly humorous while delivering rapier cuts.
“The tempo is quick and sharp and there are multiple ideas in a short space of time. Actors have to move quickly to match the play’s effervescence, however they can’t move too quickly or the audience won’t absorb the barbs,” Dyer noted.
She also raises one of the play’s themes dealing with conforming.
“If I become less authentic, what is left of who I am if I sacrifice for others’ optics? This play makes us consider what we lose when we conform.”
