NEARLY 120 years after its first performance, Oscar Wilde’s ‘trivial comedy for serious people’ has been reworked to bring a stellar cast to the stage, recreating the glory of their younger days in the original play.

To get around the incongruity of the age difference – Nigel Havers and Martin Jarvis, for example, reprise the roles they first played in 1982 – designer William Dudley and director Lucy Bailey have come up with the conceit of a group of ageing amateur actors, the Bunbury Players, putting on yet another revival of their favourite comedy.

Does it work? Yes, if you want to see some great names on stage together, and Cherie Lunghi, Sian Phillips, and the double act of Havers and Jarvis are all on good form here. The set and the costumes are simply beautiful, too, while a few departures from the original script provide some good laughs.

Overall, however, I feel that the conceit simply fails to deliver. The idea of the Bunbury Players (complete with fake programme within the real thing) needs more material, even if that has to be at the expense of some of Wilde’s words, and without it this simply falls between two stools.

When it works it’s good fun but, having bought into the premise, I came away feeling short-changed with a production that detracts from the original rather than adds to it.