THE RIVALS
The Royal Shakespeare Company's 2000 production of The Rivals opened in Stratford at The Swan on March 20th, the show's press night, and ran from March 30th - October 7th.
The RSC also had a Newcastle run for the three shows David appeared in from October 30th - November 25th at The Theatre Royal.
The show then transfered to The Barbican in London. The London press night was December 7th and the play ran from December 18, 2000 - April 17, 2001.
The director was Lindsay Posner and the show had a run time of 3 hours and 6 minutes with a 20 minute interval.
The Rivals is a comedy in five acts written by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. The play is one of only a few eighteenth-century plays that continue to be performed in the present day. The plot is somewhat complex but the characters are the common comic caricatures of human folly and are appropriately named.
The term "malapropism,"
comes from a character in this play - Mrs. Malaprop, who is constantly
using "sophisticated-sounding" words but never in the correct way!
WHATSONSTAGE calls the play one of the funniest and best loved comedies in the English language.