In Oscar Wilde’s effervescent society drama, dukes, dandies and unmarried daughters gather in drawing rooms to sip tea, exchange gossip and flirt. Comically ravishing characters engage in witty repartee, holding a mirror up to late-Victorian society values. However, this story is more than a humorous battle of the sexes. Insider trading, political corruption, hypocrisy and blackmail hold the intrigue in a comedy, that for all its touches of melodrama and farce, offers poignant insights into human frailty