Wilde, The Writer, Portrayed

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30480, 30 June 1964, Page 14

Wilde, The Writer, Portrayed

Micheal Mac Liammoir used his full-blooded voice, his vibrant personality and considerable repertoire of acting techniques to entrance his audience in the Repertory Theatre last night—the first of a-six-night season. He calls his one-man show “The Importance of Being Oscar,” and in it, for more than two' and a half hours, he surveys the life and works of Oscar Wilde—the “sick” comedian of the 1890’s, the man who “strutted his way through the first five years of the nineties, and staggered his way through the rest.”

Although a large part of the programme is taken up with an eloquently-phrased, dramatically-presented lecture on Wilde’s controversial life, it is not as a biography that this performance achieves its

greatest success. The dramatised recital of “The Ballad of Reading Gaol,” the letter “De Profundis,” the scenes from “An Ideal Husband” and “The Importance of Being Earnest,” even the account of his lecture on Renaissance art to an audience of Californian silver miners—it is through these that Wilde the writer, rather than Wilde the person, dominated the evening. It is true, of course, that being shown the relevance of his writing to the events of his life added considerably to the impact of the excerpts chosen. Mr Mac Liammoir took many parts during the evening, but it is doubtful if he ever did more than hint at the person of Oscar Wilde. Even in his affecting recital of Wilde’s deeply-felt letter to Lord Alfred, written fron

prison, the actor at work was the impression Mr Mac Liammoir gave -not the illusion that we were seeing Oscar Wilde. We were only hearing him. Amazing Rapport

If Oscar Wilde was not present in person, he was always bubbling through the characters he created, or, in his darker moods, seeping through the florid words. Mr Mac Liammoir displayed his amazing rapport with the mercurial moods of Wilde’s writing by his subtly-sketched impersonations of people as different as the gaoler who reads books, and Lady Bracknell.

One of the most exciting moments of'the evening was the telling of the last part of Wilde’s novel “The Picture of jDorian Gray.” This had all

the horror of Lon Chaney, the atmosphere of Edgar Allan Poe, and the playful suspense of Alfred Hitchcock.

The first memories of the evening to fade will be the story of Wilde's life, then will go the charm with which Mr Mac Liammoir threw away Wilde’s elegant witicisms. Last to go will be the memory of Wilde’s writings—words used generously, emotions felt deeply, a provacative sense of the religious, a perverse delight in all that is paradoxical in life. This performance is worth making a special effort to experience, for, after the immediate entertainment will surely come the stimulation of a new aquaintance with the writings of Oscar Wilde.

Which is just what Micheal Mac Liammoir would want.