Overview

Synopsis

In this high-spirited farce, the vain aging fop, Sir Harcourt, sets off to Oak Hall in the country to marry the beautiful eighteen-year-old Grace, the niece of his old friend, Max Harkaway. In doing so, he will get his hands on her fortune and secure himself a nimble young bride. Sir Harcourt leaves his son, Charles Courtly, at home, little realizing that he is a dissolute man about town and not the hard-working student Sir Harcourt believes him to be. He also does not realize that Charles has followed him to Oak Hall and is simultaneously wooing Grace, under the assumed name of Augustus Hamilton.

However, Sir Harcourt finds himself aroused and distracted by the playful Lady Gay Spanker, who has agreed to help Charles’ romance by distracting his father. With a double courtship, comical deception, and tons of naive vanity, Dion Boucicault’s farce ridicules the tendency to make snap judgments based upon fashion or wealth, town or country, nature or artifice.

Show Information

Category
Play
Age Guidance
Youth (Y)/General Audiences (G)
Number of Acts
5
First Produced
1841
Genres
Farce, Comedy, Satire
Settings
Period, Multiple Settings
Time & Place
London and Gloucestershire, 1841
Cast Size
medium
Licensor
None/royalty-free
Ideal For
Community Theatre, Large Cast, Professional Theatre, Regional Theatre, Mostly Male Cast, Includes Mature Adult, Young Adult, Adult, Late Teen Characters, Medium Cast

Lead Characters

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Charles Courtly

Lead, Female, Non-singer

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Lady Gay Spanker

Supporting, Female, Non-singer

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Guide Written By:

Alexandra Appleton

Alexandra Appleton

Writer, editor and theatre researcher