The Importance Of Being Earnest Play Analysis

When deciding what element a play should contain, one must look at a large variety of options. These options can alter how the audience depicts the play and change their overall opinions. Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” is a play set around 1895 where the protagonist, Jack Worthing, takes on two identities in order to avoid social obligations. This play’s era affects how the characters are dressed and how their households appear.

To begin with, each character is dressed in a specific way. Knowing that the play was published during the Victorian era affected my personal decisions for their proper attire. For men, sharply tailored morning suits and silk cravats were in fashion. Hats were worn at the majority of times, even when outdoors.Vests and flannel suits became increasingly fashionable during the 1890s, worn especially during the summer months. Algernon’s clothing is shown to be a black, buttoned up,

fancy sort of suit in my sketch. This is proper for Algernon due to the fact that he was a wealthy man from England. His suit fit the social normalities for wealthy people during that time. Continuing on this point, Jack Worthing’s clothing also fit the description for men in the Victorian era. In my sketch, Jack is wearing a grey vest with a white undershirt. I chose the vest for Jack because I wanted an audience to see that the story occurred during the summertime. The vest also fit the description of what men wore during this era. The tie he is seen wearing in my sketch was put in because of my own personal opinion. I feel that Jack was also a relatively wealthy man and to look that way, he would dress nicely, including a tie.
Woman in the Victorian era also had a specific normality in the way they would dress.

Female attire tended to fall into two categories: tailored suits and ball dresses, reflecting the way of life for the more wealthy. During this time, dresses tended to extend out in the shape of a bell where the end of the skirt was flared. To further describe how these dresses appeared, in an essay by James Laver, he remarks, “It is impossible to put a photograph of a fashionable woman of 1895 beside a photograph of a lamp of the same period without being struck by their close resemblance in every detail. The unmistakable sweep of the Art Nouveau line was completely parallel in the dresses of the time, in particular by the fall and swirl of the skirt.” The characters Gwendolen and Cecily are wearing ball dresses like the ones described in the Victorian era in my sketch. Their dresses are shown to be tighter in the waste (flattering their body shape) and become much wider toward the end. On the shoulders of the dresses, it fluffs up to add a decorative

effect.
Second of all, I designed Algernon’s flat in a specific way to include the audience and still stick to the script of the play. My “blueprints” include various assortments of furniture that contribute to the play's structure in act 1. For example, The table shown in the diagram would be where Algernon’s butler put the sliced cucumber sandwiches. The two loveseats would be where Jack and Algernon converse. The two large paintings on the wall show how Algernon was relatively wealthy. The chandelier on the ceiling also contributes to display the fact that he was clearly in the upper class.
In conclusion, designing the set and clothing of the characters had specific guidelines like the time period and what occurs in the play itself. Since the play was set during the Victorian era, the characters were dressed fitting specific normalities. If one did not follow these guidelines, the audience may have gotten confused and become not as interested. Therefore, the decisions I chose truly supported the time era and fully emphasized certain aspects of the characters.