Victorian Farce: The Area Belle and Duel In The Dark

A double bill of hilarious yet charming Victorian Farce: The Area Belle and Duel In The Dark performed by the Bacchae Theatre Company.

A Pandora’s box of frisky, foolish, fun & fan brandishing characters who are all in a pickle endeavoring to appease their own desires. Materializing pepper boxes, shrinking soldiers and fluffed up feathery tailcoats and wives in disguise as men. An homage of frolics from a long lost genre and era which promises to tickle your fancy brought to you by an all female cast.

AREA BELLE: This audacious 19th century farce introduces you to the eponymous 'Area Belle'; a young cook named Penelope (Miriam Babooram) who has a string of admirers and a bulging 'dairy' in which she lists the visitations of her admirers. If there is a change of plan, Penelope leaves a pepper box in the window to notify her gentleman callers that there is danger afoot. The suitors shunt off accordingly when the 'Missus' of the house (Valentina Vinci) makes an unexpected reappearance.

'The Area Belle' was written by William Brough and Andrew Halliday, and first performed at the Adelphi Theatre in 1864.

DUEL IN THE DARK: A hilarious take on a classic tale of suspected infidelity between an upper-class London husband and wife. A suspicious Mrs Greenfinch (Florence Oliveira) follows her husband (Samantha Dent) to Dieppe and, with the help of her devious maid, takes on the identity of an intimidating French Countess to discover whether her oblivious husband will fall for her advances.

Duel in the Dark was written by J. Stirling-Coyne and first performed at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in 1852.

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