'The Importance of Being Earnest' review — this joyfully reclaimed, triumphantly queer comedy is pure theatre magic

Read our review of The Importance of Being Earnest, starring Ncuti Gatwa, Hugh Skinner and Sharon D Clarke, now in performances at the National Theatre to 25 January 2025.

From the moment that Ncuti Gatwa takes to the stage dressed in a Barbie-pink satin ballgown, you know this will be a very different take on Oscar Wilde’s peerless comedy – and a totally fabulous one. But Max Webster’s revival isn’t just vibrant, joyous and triumphantly queer, it’s also a thoughtful reclamation of a play that has become far too cosy, matching Wilde’s subversive spirit in every bold creative choice.

Gatwa, now a global megastar thanks to Doctor Who, reminds us that he’s just as electrifying on stage as he puts his inimitable stamp on the louche playboy Algy. He and best friend Ernest lead double lives: Algy pretends to have an invalid friend named Bunbury so he can skip boring social events, while Ernest has invented a reprobate younger brother so he can escape his dutiful family obligations.

Webster lifts the subtext of Wilde’s farcical device, which has always been queer-coded, firmly into text. When Ernest tells Algy of his plans to propose to Gwendolen, Algy laughs in disbelief, and he teasingly sums up his friend’s different personas – “Ernest in town, Jack in the country” – with first a flirtatious booty pop and then a manly muscle flex.

Giving a similar same-sex attraction to love rivals Gwendolen and Cecily isn’t quite as effective, but it does add to the sense that this quartet’s breathless courting is really just social playacting, an absurdity caused by the imposition of arbitrary rules that force them into certain identities and behaviours. It also adds an extra charge to Wilde’s biting aphorisms about marriage, class, education, and every other Victorian sacred cow.

Webster’s outstanding cast are all perfectly attuned to his vision and strike precisely the right heightened tone to pull off this audacious reading of the play. Gatwa wonderfully reinvigorates familiar lines with his breezy spontaneity and flirtatious charisma, while Hugh Skinner, who sports a bouffant hairdo and elaborate moustache, turns the staid character of Jack/Ernest into a hilarious indignant fop.

In fact, no one is playing it straight here (in any sense). Ronke Adékọluẹ́jọ́’s sexually charged Gwendolen and Eliza Scanlen’s headstrong Cecily are more than a match for the boys in the eccentricity stakes. So too are Richard Cant’s delightfully weird Canon Chasuble, who becomes positively giddy at the prospect of doing an adult baptism, Amanda Lawrence’s desperately yearning Miss Prism, and a scene-stealing Julian Bleach as two servants, the worldly-wise Lane and doddery, gong-thumping Merriman.

But it is, of course, the imperious Sharon D Clarke who takes top honours. From her resplendent entrance in a gleaming yellow gown, hat the size of a satellite dish, and expertly wielded cane, she holds the stage with cool command.

In effective contrast to the giddy camp riot surrounding her, Clarke gives her Lady Bracknell an understated but utterly devastating disdain. The look that she gives Ernest would curdle milk, and she all but swallows that famous “A handbag?” as though choking back bile. Her disciplined Lady B has clearly fought to reach this position, and she has no intention of relaxing her iron grip now.

Webster adds in some gleeful fourth-wall-breaking, contemporary pop (James Blunt, Bruno Mars), Bridgerton-style, and an unusual level of physical comedy (buoyant movement by Carrie-Anne Ingrouille) to match the exuberance of Wilde’s wit. A gloriously silly running gag involves the characters trying to maintain their dignity while skidding down the sloped lawn at Jack’s country house.

Rae Smith’s candy-coloured design is likewise inspired. Even when attired in a suit, Algy rebels with his hot-pink socks, the sheltered Cecily’s girlish innocence is parodied in her frilled shepherdess frock and tortured ringlets, and Smith adds another meta joke by framing the action with a proscenium arch and red velvet curtain.

Throughout, the production seems to be in knowing conversation with Wilde’s arch assertion that we live “in an age of surfaces”; style is just as revealing as sincerity. This is a dazzling carnival, but one with absolute purpose – and the climactic reveal is extraordinarily moving. It has the sense of wonder you feel when the statue moves in A Winter’s Tale or Viola and Sebastian reunite. This is where you’ll find pure magic theatre this Christmas.

The Importance of Being Earnest is at the National Theatre to 25 January 2025, and is screened in cinemas via NT Live on 20 February 2025.

Photo credit: The Importance of Being Earnest (Photos by Marc Brenner)