The Importance of Being Oscar Wilde's Valet

The Cultural Programme at Oxford University in partnership with Blackwell's Bookshop, Oxford.

Join award-winning playwrights Bobby Theodore and JC Niala for a presentation and discussion of their collaborative work in progress, The Importance of Being Oscar Wilde's Valet.

Set in Oxford, this play explores the imagined experiences of Stephen Stephens, Oscar Wilde’s African-American valet, who accompanied Wilde to the UK after being promised an acting career beyond minstrelsy during Wilde’s 1882-3 tour of the US. Both men lived with a dual consciousness – Wilde as an Irishman striving for Englishness, and Stephens seeking a fresh start after a history of enslavement.

Bobby Theodore is a two-time Betty Mitchell Award winner, a Canadian Screen Award finalist, and a Governor General’s Award finalist. JC Niala is an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Warwick and received the 2021 Nancy Dean Prize for her play Out of Bounds.