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My name is Keith Baxter, and this is my 21st birthday because 21 years ago, I was in a
hotel room in Glasgow, in Scotland, filming, and the telephone rang, and somebody said,
"My name is Michael Kahn, and you don't know me, but you'd like working with me very much,
and come and play the Duke in 'Measure for Measure.'" That was 21 years ago, and now
I'm coming back to direct the 8th play he's asked me to direct, and this one is "The Importance
of Being Earnest" by Oscar Wilde.
The play is set in London and in the country, and there are two great friends, uh, Algernon
and Earnest Worthing, and they both lead secret lives. They both invented an alter-ego, so
they can go off and play, and during the course of the play, their disguise is exploded and
they both fall in love, um, and that's really the story of the play. It's a very simple
story.
I did—directed "An Ideal Husband" two years ago, and it was a colossal success. It was
very different from "The Importance of Being Earnest" because it was a serious play and
very lavish. We had a company of 25 actors, but audiences like the wit and the style of,
um, Wilde, and the, I, when I first came to Washington, one of the things that pleased
me very much was how sophisticated the audience are. They, they're much more sophisticated,
funny enough, than the West End audience. I don't why that should be, but it's a matter
of fact, and they respond. I hear them when they're watching Wilde. I hear them responding
the wit and the style of the language, and it's a very diverse audience, which is exciting.