De Profundis, Vaudeville Theatre

‘I am one of those who are made for exceptions, not for laws.’ The tragedy of of Oscar Wilde’s tumultuous life as expressed in De Profundis, arguably the most famous love letter in the English language, is enacted on stage at the Vaudeville Theatre as part of a year-long Oscar Wilde Season.

The missive, sent shortly before Wilde’s untimely death, will be adapted for the stage by Tony winning playwright and poet Frank McGuinness. This limited staging, performed across only three evenings, promises to be a vivid and galling rendering of the playwright’s thwarted love for Lord Alfred Bosie.

It is hard to think of a better way of commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in the UK. Wilde’s and Bosie’s relationship was abruptly terminated when the former was imprisoned at Reading jail for ‘gross indecency’ – a sentence which marked the end of an illustrious and iconoclastic career, and ultimately of Wilde’s life.