Cause Célèbre
by Terence Rattigan
15th to 17th November 2001
Rattigan's last play, completed in 1976, is based on the real story of Alma Rattenbury, who in 1935 was acquitted at the Old Bailey of murdering her husband, thirty years her senior.
In a series of flashbacks and composite settings the play tells the story of Alma Rattenbury, the attractive but emotionally self-indulgent young wife, her 17 year old lover Wood and her murdered husband "Ratz" Rattenbury. It follows the course of the trial and the effect it has on the jury forewoman, Edith Davenport who is going through a divorce and faces the loss of her 17 year old son to her ex-husband.
In the course of her trial Alma Rattenbury is condemned by the public more for seducing a younger man than for the crime of murder of which she is accused.
