A woman generally gets her own way, declares Mrs Dot - thereby giving away, if we didn't already know it, that her character is penned by a man. But you quickly forgive Mr Maugham his little cynicism as the spell of Mrs Dot's coquettish ways to prove the point, begins to light up me stage. From a spark of an idea, Mrs Dot (Janet Dale) sets off a whole fireworks of light-hearted intrigue to get her man. She naturally wins and in the process provokes some wonderful laughs at English values and the upper classes in Edwardian times.

A widow with a brewery and business flair, she falls in love with an impoverished younger man - the second son of an Honourable. Her love is requited but, alas, Gerald (Steven Mann) fell under the spell of the moon and proposed to a young lady Nellie (Rebecca Charles) some three years before during a weekend in the country. His honour does not prevent him dating Mrs Dot but gets in the way of him breaking the promise. Once Mrs Dot has established that no love is lost between the two, she cries for two days and then decides on a little weekend party at her own house to play to win her own mating game.

In The Importance of Being Earnest genre, with less exaggeration and plotting, Mrs Dot has similar ingredients with the formidable mother, Lady Sellinger (Madeleine Newbury) and the elderly spinster Miss Macgregor (Gillian Webb). The young lover Freddie Perkins (Gordon Lovitt) nearly steals the picture as well as young Nellie – a delightful performance from this young actor. Roland Curram plays James Blenkinsop, ‘a cynic, a millionaire and a bachelor' on the surface a more suitable match for the widow, a Maugham look-alike figure who is happy to play the love game but terrified at the thought of complete surrender. Janet Dale with her impish face suits the title role. She shows strength through humour but occasionally gets dangerously close to farce with slightly exaggerated gestures.

Under Wendy  Toye’s skilful direction the play, after a. slightly unpromising start, takes off into a light and fluffy creation, a perfect piece for the Palace birthday celebration. Both play and the Palace are 80 - but both vibrant and  the Palace stage decked out in best party dress for the occasion. Scene changes were performed with such elegance by a crew of pierrots, they received their very own round of applause from the first night audience.