Elegant Madness hits Brewery Arts (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Elegant Madness hits Brewery Arts

THE DUAL Theatre Company brings An Elegant Madness by Ron Hutchinson to Brewery Arts, Cirencester on Friday, February 20 at 7.30pm.

The play charts the decline and fall of Beau Brummell, one of the most extraordinary of all Englishmen in a time rich in wits, dandies, beaux and eccentrics.

Notorious for regularly having his manservant re-tie his stock 23 separate times until it was perfect - with each of the rejected stocks having to be freshly laundered and starched - his devotion to dress and outer appearance masked a deeper concern for the role of style in human life.

A public rupture with his lifelong friend and patron, the Prince Regent, victim of one of his more merciless jobs of wit, led ultimately to disaster, social and personal.

Beggared by his lifelong addiction to gambling, he was forced to flee to France where years of poverty, exile and finally madness lay ahead.

The play is set on the day when the Prince, now King, visits Calais where the Beau, living with his raffish manservant Austin, appears confidently to expect that the long estrangement will be at an end and he will be able to return to his position in English life....

An Elegant Madness has had rave reviews from both national and regional papers and is being performed at Brewery Arts in aid of the Cotswold Counselling and Support Centre in Cirencester.

The Centre provides people who feel the need with the opportunity to talk to trained counsellors in confidence.

Tickets for An Elegant Madness from Brewery Arts box office on 01285 655522. The ticket price includes a glass of wine and there will be a reception before the play, at 7pm.