Ridiculous but Relevant: UCL’s DramaSoc brings to life ‘An Ideal Husband’
Photo Courtesy of UCL DramaSoc, art by @mill0scape on Instagram
UCL’s DramaSoc brings Oscar Wilde’s ‘An Ideal Husband’ to life, Coco Kemp-Welch discusses its relevance and ridiculousness with both cast and crew.
While the final rehearsals for Oscar Wilde’s lesser known play, ‘An Ideal Husband’, were underway around Bloomsbury over reading week, I had the pleasure of speaking to the production’s co-director, Sophie Eaton; co-producer, Seth Robinson; Leah Dawson (Mabel Chiltern) and Avesta Maqsudi (Mrs Cheveley), who all offered me great insight into the relevance of the play to today.
When deciding which play to put on, Sophie and her co-director, Jai Britto, sought plays that had made them “fall in love with theatre in the first place”. Shakespeare sprung to mind first, but it was the co-directors’ foundational knowledge on Oscar Wilde, his “interesting life”, but also the consistently out-of-touch approaches to his plays “always performed in RP (Received Pronunciation) accents and [with] middle-aged actors”, that inspired them to take this opportunity to revitalise ‘An Ideal Husband’. They not only hope to connect this production with “the audience for which it was originally intended”, that is, young people, but they have also employed an age-appropriate cast, allowing for the true depth of satirical comedy to be realised in the interplay of the old and young generations.
Photo courtesy of Dylan Elliot
It’s clear that the core creative team behind ‘An Ideal Husband’, who have previously worked together, operate as a productive fusion of inspiration, or in Seth’s words, “a goopy little melting pot of creativeness”. Sophie reiterates this sentiment, which is perhaps one of the reasons that they are undaunted by the significant task ahead of them. In fact, both Sophie and Seth, not to mention Alexis Rendel, Seth’s co-producer, and Jai, all have acting experience just as a lot of the actors have producing experience, which allows them to “cover all bases because we have a team that have talents in a variety of areas” and “helps [them] balance each other out”.
In attempt to steer the conversation onto the thematic relevancies of the play, specifically how Chiltern’s political mistakes are applicable to modern day cancel culture and Gen Z’s austere sense of morality, I end up sounding like an English teacher. Still, Leah tackles my questions admirably, commenting that “with the rise of social media, people have become less aware of their own selves, especially when putting judgement onto other people”, it is through this play that the audience are forced to “gain self-awareness” and reflect on why they condemn others for menial mistakes. Sophie chimes in that Chiltern’s political corruption is particularly topical and “rings so true to today, especially with cancel culture” as she can’t remember the “last time we forgave a politician for something; a well-intentioned politician that did a terrible thing”. Seth does question whether “well-intentioned politicians” do indeed exist… yet Sophie’s point stands. Whether the existence of altruistic politicians is provable or not, cancel culture is evidence of our generation’s inability to forgive and Avesta is keen to see “where the audience’s empathy lies”.
Photo Courtesy of UCL DramaSoc, art by @mill0scape on Instagram
Sophie notes that “as a generation, we hold ourselves to such a high standard, which is a good thing as it implies, for the first time, that everyone just wants to be a good person… and that there is an ethical belief that just to be kind to one another is a good thing”. She notices a counteraction, however, in the inability to compromise our morality for forgiveness and that we are reluctant to forgive, oftentimes actively seeking “distasteful things with which to drag celebrities down”. While political corruption and blackmail are hardly revolutionary, Mrs Cheveley’s “active digging into someone’s background for her own gain” reflects “ a very modern concept” – a key aspect of ‘An Ideal Husband’s’ revitalisation for their modern audience.
Another such aspect is the play’s tackling of morality for women. Sophie is interested by how women are “always doubly scrutinised compared to men” in the public eye and are required to “watch their behaviour”. This is particularly relevant to the wives of politicians: “Jackie Kennedy, Michelle Obama, even Melania Trump”, and now Gertrude Chiltern. She notices that the husband-politician is tasked with “the decisions for the country”, whereas the wife-figurehead is tasked with embodying the “image of her country in her very self”, through her body, actions, and even fashion. Seth adds that their “own spin on the production” lies in its “ridiculousness and hysteria”, typically feminine characteristics that they have gifted to the male characters instead. His excitement lies in whether this hysteria will endear the audience to Chiltern or whether it will exacerbate his wrong doings. In a similar vein, Sophie wonders whether this example of “really intense emotion, which is so often applied to women, will be considered hysterical and unreasonable when applied to two men”.
Yet, above all else, this play is about a couple’s dynamic. Sophie notes that it is one of the few plays of the moment that centres itself around a “compromise, when every other play is about huge sacrifices and irreparable damage”. Perhaps this “compromise” is just what our generation needs to witness, to learn, to understand in order to bind our morality with a sense of self-aware forgiveness.
An Ideal Husband is running from 16th to 18th November 2023 at the Bloomsbury Theatre.