The Recruiting Officer

George Farquhar's popular Restoration Comedy. During a lull in the War of the Spanish Succession, Captain Plume comes to Shrewsbury, to seduce soldiers into the army, and - if possible - recruit Silvia into marriage.

The Recruiting Officer enjoyed enormous success and popular acclaim during the eighteenth century, when it was produced more often than any other play, outstripping its nearest rival, Hamlet, by a wide margin. Part of BBC Radio 3's 18th Century Season.

First broadcast in December 2011

The play holds the honour of being the first piece of theatre ever to be produced in Australia, with a cast of convicts and officers, an event described by Thomas Keneally in his book The Playmaker, and then dramatised by Timberlake Wertenbaker in her play, Our Country's Good. A double bill of the two plays was staged in repertory to great acclaim at The Royalz Court in 1988, with a common cast.