The Rivals

Classic comedy by Richard Brinsley Sheridan on the complications of love, status and manners with extraordinary comic characters. It's 1775 and the fashionable world descends on Bath, to take the waters, to show off their finery, to enjoy the gossip and to pursue romance. Amongst them are some of the most extraordinary comic characters to grace the stage: the verbally misguided Mrs Malaprop, her absurdly romantic niece, Lydia Languish, the blinkered Sir Anthony Absolute, the blustering Irishman Sir Lucius O'Trigger and the bumpkin Bob Acres. Throughout the course of single day these suitors and schemers and their servants indulge in an assortment of hilariously extravagant intrigues before everyone is paired off to their own satisfaction.

The comedy is notable for introducing the word malapropism - meaning the mistaken use of a word in place of a similar-sounding one, often with an amusing effect - named after the character Mrs Malaprop.