"The Importance of Being Earnest" is probably Oscar Wilde's best-known play, It is a drawing-room comedy, following the adventures of two young men about town, Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieffe, as they pursue two young ladies, Gwendolen Fairfax (who happens to be Algernon's cousin) and Cecily Cardew (who happens to be Jack's ward). The title derives from the facts that both Jack and Algernon, for reasons too complex to explain here, both pretend to be Jack's (non-existent) brother Ernest and that both Gwendolen and Cecily dream of falling in love with a man called Ernest, which they consider a particularly distinguished and masculine name.
This is probably the best-known adaptation of the play. It has also proved particularly influential. I must admit that I have not seen any of the other cinema or TV versions, but I have seen several stage performances, both professional and amateur, and all seem to bear the marks of the influence of Anthony Asquith's film. This is particularly true of Dame Edith Evans's magnificently over-the-top performance as Gwendolen's monstrous old battle-axe of a mother, Lady Bracknell. Dame Edith's expostulation of the phrase "A handbag?" has passed into legend. (She has just learned that Jack, the man courting her daughter, was a foundling, found in a handbag on a London railway station and subsequently adopted by a wealthy benefactor).
The film is faithful to both Wilde's plot and to his dialogue, and is made in the "filmed theatre" style with no attempt being made to "open it up". One difference is that the two male leads are considerably older here than the characters envisaged by Wilde; Jack is supposed to be 28 and Algernon (who turns out to be his younger brother) rather younger, but Michael Redgrave would have been 44 in 1952 and Michael Denison 37. This does not, however, really matter, as both actors are very much at home with Wilde's style of bantering humour and acquit themselves splendidly. The same can be said of Joan Greenwood as Gwendolyn and Dorothy Tutin as Cecily. I wondered if Greenwood was cast because, like Evans who plays her mother, she spoke in deep contralto tones. There is little visual resemblance between them, but there is certainly a vocal one.
"The Importance of Being Earnest" is in my view one of the most sparklingly witty plays in the English language, and here it is given a first-rate performance by an excellent cast. The sale of production may seem a little old-fashioned seventy-odd years after it was made, but it is still well worth seeing. 8/10.
This is probably the best-known adaptation of the play. It has also proved particularly influential. I must admit that I have not seen any of the other cinema or TV versions, but I have seen several stage performances, both professional and amateur, and all seem to bear the marks of the influence of Anthony Asquith's film. This is particularly true of Dame Edith Evans's magnificently over-the-top performance as Gwendolen's monstrous old battle-axe of a mother, Lady Bracknell. Dame Edith's expostulation of the phrase "A handbag?" has passed into legend. (She has just learned that Jack, the man courting her daughter, was a foundling, found in a handbag on a London railway station and subsequently adopted by a wealthy benefactor).
The film is faithful to both Wilde's plot and to his dialogue, and is made in the "filmed theatre" style with no attempt being made to "open it up". One difference is that the two male leads are considerably older here than the characters envisaged by Wilde; Jack is supposed to be 28 and Algernon (who turns out to be his younger brother) rather younger, but Michael Redgrave would have been 44 in 1952 and Michael Denison 37. This does not, however, really matter, as both actors are very much at home with Wilde's style of bantering humour and acquit themselves splendidly. The same can be said of Joan Greenwood as Gwendolyn and Dorothy Tutin as Cecily. I wondered if Greenwood was cast because, like Evans who plays her mother, she spoke in deep contralto tones. There is little visual resemblance between them, but there is certainly a vocal one.
"The Importance of Being Earnest" is in my view one of the most sparklingly witty plays in the English language, and here it is given a first-rate performance by an excellent cast. The sale of production may seem a little old-fashioned seventy-odd years after it was made, but it is still well worth seeing. 8/10.