Mary Broome @ the Mint Theatre

This play written in 1911 by Allan Monkhouse is about an aristocratic English family; the Timbrells.  The prodigal son & his society fiancee are about to be wed when it is discovered that the younger nor-do-well son, Leonard, has gotten the household maid, Mary, pregnant.  The play lacks any  appeal as an upstairs/downstairs, servant drama.  It was written as a comedy.  If it was humorous at the time, it is merely droll today.  Leonard Timbrell is a rogue who has never worked a day & totally dependent on an allowance as deemed from his father & older brother, Edgar.  I imagine Leonard was supposed to exude charm as a loquacious intellectual.  He came across as an annoying buffoon.  Alas, poor Mary, the family's longtime housemaid is seduced by Leonard and finds herself, as they would, with child.  The father decrees that Leonard marry MARY or be cast out penniless for the  shame wrought onto the family name.  Neither Leonard or Mary are quite sure they love each other enough to become betrothed.  Leonard realizes he would fare better to wed than to manage without his family's wealth.  Once their son is born, Mary finds true happiness with her child but Leonard feels encumbered tied down by a wife and child.  The ephiphanies Leonard & Mary's in-laws discover are too late and anti-climatic.  This dated play, Mary Broome, needs to be swept away with the dust.  Leonard was a wank & the show stank.