Review by Paul Towers, 3/6/26
An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde
Directed by Nicholai La Barrie
Produced by Lyric Hammersmith & Bristol
Old Vic
At Lyric until 6th June 2026
An Oscar Wilde play is guaranteed to be
wickedly funny and deliciously bitchy. An Ideal Husband is all of these things
BUT this production suffers from several self indulgent interventions by the
director Nicholai La Barrie.
Set in so-called modern London it features a
mainly black cast except for the two main leads Mrs Cheveley (Aurora Perrineau)
and Viscount Goring (Jamael Westman). I have no issue with colour blind casting
but several things jarred about this production. Most of the costumes were of
Afo-Caribbean style (by Rajha Shakiry) and two of the characters spoke with
pronounced Jamaican accents. On top of that was the excruciating soundtrack
used in several places. It was completely over-the-top, loud and irrelevant.
There were also the various modern references added to the script.
Wilde’s text has a rhythm all of its own and
messing with the content ruins it. You wouldn’t start adding in bits to a
Shakespeare and this amounts to the same thing.
That said, there are a few outstanding performances
that negate the disappointments. Jamael Westman’s very camp and effete Viscount
Goring is a joy, verging on drag-queenery, and probably written as Wilde dreamt
of being. Emmanuel Akwafo, Mason in the first half and Phipps in the second is
superbly indolent as manservant Mason and hilariously camp in the second half
as Goring’s confidant. The third stand out character is Tiwa Lade’s Mabel,
Goring’s protentional wife, an hilariously outrageous loud slut about town.
While there were a few jarring elements to
this production, by and large you can’t completely screw up an Oscar Wilde play
that has been popular for 130 years so long as you are loyal to the script.
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