The Importance of Being Earnest
This is one of my favourite plays. I’ve worked behind the scenes twice, seen it live at least half a dozen times, and seen various movie versions more than that.
Often because someone is foolish enough to tell me they’ve never seen it and then taken me up on an offer to watch it with them.
Typing this made me realise I haven’t watched it since we’ve moved, or indeed since watching it during COVID lockdowns. So I’ve added it to my list of things to do during my two weeks off when MBS is closed.
For me I find Oscar Wilde’s contrast between very serious things and then very trivial things being examined and explored interesting. I find that it helps me see something new often because of what I’m involved with, or have been thinking about, or am aware of happening in the world around me.
Earnestness — a determined and serious desire to do the correct thing is something that I am all too often concentrating on, so it is good to be reminded that often what I’m worrying about isn’t important in the long run.
Laughing at the silliness of things that the protagonists are concerned about, can remind me about some of the momentarily important things that capture my attention and distract me from those things that are eternal.
“[The Importance of Being Earnest] is exquisitely trivial, a delicate bubble of fancy, and it has its philosophy…That we should treat all the trivial things of life very seriously, and all the serious things of life with sincere and studied triviality.”
Have you ever seen the play? Or a filmed version?
The National Theatre is currently showing a version until the 25th February. I may need to arrange a trip up to London in January…
“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”
Wendrie Heywood
MBS Founder
