Get all your news in one place.
100's of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Arifa Akbar

An Ideal Husband review – Oscar Wilde’s comedy gets the gleefully camp glow-up it deserves

Jamael Westman kneels before Tiwa Lade in a white lace dress beside a chair in an elegant room
Wildean minx … Tiwa Lade, left, with Jamael Westman in An Ideal Husband. Photograph: Helen Murray

Oscar Wilde’s comedy was billed as a “play of modern life” when it premiered at the Haymarket theatre in London in 1895. It is just as modern now in its central, chiming theme: the clandestine corruptions of outwardly squeaky-clean members of parliament.

Sir Robert Chiltern (Chiké Okonkwo) is the apparently upstanding minister and “ideal husband” to Lady Chiltern (Tamara Lawrance) but his past bears the illicit selling of a cabinet secret to a baron. This threatens to ruin him if he does not appease the blackmailing Mrs Cheveley (Aurora Perrineau).

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100's of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.