LORD Arthur Savile (Jason Green) is due to marry his beautiful fiancée (Steph Dearden) when his future motherin- law engages a cheiromantist to check his suitability.

However, what fortune does the palm-reader see? Is all as it seems and must murder really feature as an inevitable event?

Green was amusing as the hapless, foppish groom and Dearden’s razor-sharp repartee with him was in keeping with her character. Sally Whyte and Janet West’s experience and comic skill, as Savile’s respectively eccentric and redoubtable aunts, lifted every scene they were in.

In a play based on one of Oscar Wilde’s short stories, all the ingredients were there to create a dark comedy satirizing late 19th century upper-class society but was ultimately unsatisfying; strange directorial decisions meant that blocking and some overacting was an issue, with use of the prompt restricting flow and pace, although the splendid array of costumes and well-dressed set established the period.