Charley's Aunt October 24, 2008

Nothing is funnier than several cases of mistaken identity, especially when gender roles are mixed up. In 'Charley's Aunt,' two undergraduates at Oxford need a chaperone to ask the objects of their desire on dates. They convince their friend to pretend to be Charley's aunt to do this, but when Charley's real aunt shows up, their plan falls apart and confusion escalates. The play had a historically long original London run of 1,466 performances in 1893. It has since appeared on Broadway both in its original version and as a musical, and been made into several film versions, including two silent films and one of the earliest "talkie" comedies in 1930.