Charley's Aunt

Synopsis

Charley's rich Aunt, Dona Lucia, is visiting from Brazil (where the nuts come from!). The timing couldn't be better. Her presence as a chaperone will allow him and his friend Jack to invite their respective true loves, Amy and Kitty, for luncheon to ask for their hands in marriage. Time is ticking, Amy is soon to leave for Scotland, but where is Charley's Aunt? On learning she is delayed by several days, scuppering their romantic plans, they blackmail their eccentric friend, Lord Fancourt Babberley, to pose as Dona Lucia. Chaos ensue as the imposter Aunt is courted by Jack's father and Amy's guardian. And then Charlie's real Aunt arrives...

Our Review:

Gill Kirk - 12 November 2012

Ian Talbot’s revival of Brandon Thomas’s 1890s comedy, Charley’s Aunt, abetted by Paul Farnsworth’s excellent design, makes one wonder whether plays such as this and the comedies of Oscar Wilde were in fact the Made in Chelsea of their day: Old Etonians on the verge of adulthood, capering around their manor, in a range of scrapes in the name of catching a fine filly and a wealthy future.

Jack Dominic Tighe and Charley Benjamin Askew are in love with young ladies, Kitty and Amy, Leah Whitaker and Ellie Beaven, from whom we hear relatively little. Charley has a beneficent millionairess aunt, whom he’s never met - but will today! The chaps invite the gels for lunch, with said aunt pencilled in as chaperone. But when she doesn’t show, champers-guzzling chum Lord Fancourt Babberley Matthew Horne is roped in to impersonate the aunt, so the luncheon can go ahead. Not unsurprisingly, the aunt - Jane Asher - appears after all, and is a million miles from...

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