‘Ideal Husband’ A Wilde Play Without The Bite

Oliver Parker’s adaptation of the Oscar Wilde play “An Ideal Husband” has a little bit of everything - comedy, melodrama, period-piece settings and good acting.

It lacks just one small trifle: the bite of Wilde himself.

If you know anything about the infamous Irish playwright and poet, you know that - some 80 years before Truman Capote did something similar - he made his reputation by mocking the very audience that supported him. In plays such as “The Importance of Being Earnest” and “Lady Windemere’s Fan,” Wilde thrived by creating a new kind of comedy based on clever repartee, barbed wit and a savage tendency for exposing the hypocritical predilections of upper-class Victorian society.

Wilde, in the end, would suffer severe retribution. The trouble with biting the hand that feeds you, of course, is that the hand often turns into a clenched fist. And that fist, in the form of an irate noble named the Marquess of Queensberry, smote Wilde so hard that he ended up jailed, bankrupt and dead by age 46.

But his works live on. Probably the most famous is Anthony Asquith’s 1952 film version of “The Importance of Being Earnest.” Parker’s film is hardly in that category, even if it does have its qualities.

Chief among those: Rupert Everett. Still on a high from his notable supporting role in the Julia Roberts romantic comedy “My Best Friend’s Wedding” (and, more recently, in “Shakespeare in Love” and “William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream”), Everett makes the perfect leading man.

Especially when that leading man is Lord Arthur Goring, a dashing man-about-London who - though now in the downside of his mid-30s - remains a confirmed party animal (even if always a gentleman).

It is through Lord Goring whom Wilde channels his best lines. “I love talking about nothing,” he says at one point. “It’s the only thing I know anything about.”

But Lord Goring, as Parker/Wildewould have us believe, is hardly a wastrel. And he’s even less a scoundrel. When his distant cousin/best friend, Sir Robert Chiltern (Jeremy Northam), comes to him with a problem, he’s anxious to help any way he can. The problem is serious (and representative of the complex intrigues that Wilde adeptly used to skewer the rich): On the eve of his delivering an important speech before Parliament, a speech that could very well make his reputation and lead to a government post, Sir Chiltern becomes the subject of a blackmail threat.

Delivered by the devious Mrs. Laura Cheverly (Julianne Moore), the threat involves a demand: Either Sir Chilthern supports a project in which Mrs. Cheverly has heavily invested, or she will publish letters proving that he - at a much younger age - profited nefariously through insider information.

This is typical Wilde. In his London, those with social position will do anything to keep it, while those who desire the same will walk over whomever they must to acquire it. It’s a world where reputation is valued more than everything except pedigree, but especially more than good intentions.

Thus the comic potential is enormous. Sir Chilthern appeals to Lord Goring, begging that he intervene with Mrs. Cheverly. It seems Lady Chilthern (Cate Blanchett) is more in love with what she sees as her husband’s good character than she is with the man himself, and the good sir fears their coupling won’t survive a public flogging.

The experienced Lord Goring, meanwhile, has had his own dealings with Mrs. Cheverly. And besides being a devoted admirer of Lady Chilthern, he is smitten with her sister, Mabel Chilthern (Minnie Driver), whose attractive person is more than matched by her ability to stalemate her lordly admirer with wordplay.

In his stage play, Wilde mixes all these subplots - throwing Lord Goring’s frustrated father (John Wood) into the mix - into a froth of doublespeak, intrigue and mixed messages. The result is both fulfilling romance and social commentary, with commentary being the more important ingredient.

Parker, however, has reworked Wilde’s play (the two share screenwriting credits). His film seems intent on appealing to the widest audience possible, both the kind that likes its Masterpiece Theatre and the kind that wants a Hollywood-spirited resolution.

This transformation doesn’t spoil “An Ideal Husband.” The film buzzes with good acting (especially by Everett, Blanchett and the American Moore, who holds her own in an otherwise British production).

And, in the end, even a muted Wilde is cleverer by far than most contemporary pundits.

Yet consider this line from “The Importance of Being Earnest”: “Really,” one character says, “if the lower orders don’t set us a good example, what on earth is the use of them?”

That’s the edge that’s missing from “An Ideal Husband.”

“AN IDEAL HUSBAND” *** Location: Lyons Ave. Cinemas. Credits: Directed by Oliver Parker from the play by Oscar Wilde, starring Rupert Everett, Julianne Moore, Jeremy Northam, Cate Blanchett, Minnie Driver, John Wood. Running time: 1:36 Rating: PG-13