Newcastle directors Nick Thoroughgood and Rylee O’Rourke are set to cause quite a stir with their adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest next week.

The cheeky interpretation, which takes to the stage at the Maitland Repertory Theatre on Wednesday 24 November, is being touted as a performance for “anyone in need of belly-aching humour post-lockdown”.

Set in the pseudo-modern 1980s the play is a satire on the hypocrisies of the repressive Victorian era, with Wilde highlighting the shallow and class-obsessed society in which homosexuality was forbidden. 

In fact, after the first performance of the play he initiated a libel suit that led to his imprisonment for being gay.

Within the play Wilde exposes gender stereotypes by reversing them, empowering women and creating male characters as the weaker of the two.

Thoroughgood and O’Rourke have taken this one step further, choosing to have the male lead, Algernon performed by seasoned local actor, director and writer, Anna Lambert, while Campbell Knox, another local veteran, takes on the role of Gwendolen.

The storyline is moulded around two bachelors, John “Jack” Worthing (played by acclaimed Newcastle actor Carl Gregory) and Algernon “AIgy” Moncrieff who create alter egos named Ernest.

Things begin to go awry in the two-and-a-half hour play when the pair’s deceptions are discovered by their potential fiancées, Gwendolen and Cecily (Maddison Lamb) who claim to only love men called Ernest.

Lady Bracknell (Dimity Eveleens) personifies the ethos that style beats substance while Miss Prism (Rebecca Skinner) and the Rev Chasuble (Roger Wood) mock religion with their flirtatious, coded conversations.

Comic sidekicks, ‘mirror’ manservants Lane (Richard Rae) and Merriman (Stuart Ussher) represent the downtrodden working classes.

The play opens on 24 November and runs until 12 December and includes three matinees and six evening performances. 

Tickets are $25 ($20 concession) and bookings can be made at mrt.org.au or by phoning 0466 332 766 (10am to 2pm daily). 

Opening night audience will be treated to complimentary refreshments before the show from 7.30pm.

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