The Beaux Stratagem

Rakes, Lovers, Desperate Housewives, Herbal Healers and Horse Thieves...

The Lichfield stagecoach is a’comin’ on over the hill, laden with gallants and garters intent on fine females and their even finer fortunes. But are they prepared for cross dressing Irish priests, a band of honourable highwaymen, lardy landlords, scheming servants and aimless alliteration?

The stage is set for one of the finest Restoration Comedies of the age. Farquar knits together a panoply of stock and ‘not so stock’ characters, weaving plots and sub plots in an 18th Century ‘One Man Two Governors’, where not all is as it seems and the country folk of Lichfield are not quite as dumb as we think. Well not quite...