Frome Drama Club: Jack Absolute Flies Again

Oliver Chris and Richard Bean (One Man, Two Guv’nors) wrote this hilarious updated version of Sheridan’s The Rivals and set it in 1940 at RAF Fontwell during the Battle of Britain. Fighter pilot Jack Absolute attempts to rekindle his romance with wealthy Flying Auxiliary Lydia Languish, but she has decided a working-class northerner in the form of mechanic Dudley Scunthorpe is for her (but he has the hots for the maid, Lucy).

Two other pilots (a demented poet and a crazy Australian) are suitors for Lydia, so Jack resorts to desperately comic measures to convince Lydia that he is the best man. General Absolute, his father, has his own agenda for Lydia, who is the ward of Mrs Malaprop, who owns Malaprop Hall, requisitioned by the RAF as the fighter base. The result is farcical mayhem of the funniest kind.

This is an amateur performance.