The importance of being earnest is a play that first performed on February 14th 1895. The play was written by Oscar wilde. The play is very comedic and in my opinion a satire comedy. Because of its high farce and witty dialogue, its helped it to become one of the most popular enduring plays. The play had a successful opening night and marked the climax of wilde’s career. Over the years the play has been revived quite a bit. Including a film adaption in the year 2002. How did the movie adapt this famous play? Was it faithful or loosely adapted? The film adaption of the importance of being earnest was released in the year 2002. It featured a star studded cast including Rupert Everett, Colin Firth, Reese Witherspoon, and Judi Dench. When it comes to the critical and financial success of the film, the movie received mixed to positive reviews and made $17 million dollars.
When it comes to faithful adaptions of a source material, this film really gets the job done. At the point when screenwriters adjust a literary work for either the widescreen or TV, they regularly need to roll out improvements in the first for various reasons. But this isn’t the case or the film adaption. The characters in the film are very much similar to their counterparts in Oscar wilde’s play. There are just a few minor changes. For example, the film adaption indicates that jacks character is 35 years old while the original play indicates that he is 29 years old. This change isn’t too serious but I do not understand why this change was made. It could be because the actor was around that age. Firth is also perfectly casted in the role of jack. He’s charming and quirky like wilde’s original version. Rupert firth plays Algernon perfectly as well. They seem to bring to life the characters Oscar wilde created perfectly and it definitely pays off in the end.
One difference that is very clear is that in the film version, the characters of miss Prism and the Reverend seem to come off flat and comical. While in the play they have subtler satire to the Victorian self-behavior and religious hypocrisy. The reverend also is portrayed in the film farcical character, and the only one that is focused on a more religious satire. While in the play he is more developed as character. One last difference that can be noticed is that it’s much more modernized for the times. It’s definitely done so that the film can appeal to movie audiences so that it could reach a wider audience. Besides a few minor changes, the film captures the silly satire that Oscar wilde made apparent in his play. Personally I enjoy the film a lot more because of the great performances given by the main cast. I also enjoyed the music choices and new things added to the film. It definitely feels very needed to modernize the play. The film proved to be just as hilarious today as the original play did in the 19th century.
Many things that are adapted into a film seem to miss the actual point of the original source material. They fail to see the real point of the original work and start to mess with it to a point where it’s almost unrecognizable. But the director Oliver parker did exactly the opposite. He seems to understand the comedy that wilde was portraying in his play and adapted it very well with just a few changes. Many directors should not change too much or it makes a mess of the source material. In conclusion, I enjoyed the original and the film adaption very much. they have a sense of comedy that is missing in many works today.
Many people today might take offence to this type of satire but that’s the point. Its satire humor which many people should realize that it’s not trying to be serious. Its only trying to poke fun at certain things in society. Oscar wilde’s play is among the greatest plays made and because of the film many more people can experience it in a more modern take.
