The 100th anniversary of the death of the great playwright and wit Oscar Wilde is being marked in Oxford with a 'Wilde 100' festival, organised in close conjunction with his old college, Magdalen, writes Chris Gray.

Its central feature is major new production of his best-known work, The Importance of Being Earnest, which opens tomorrow night at the Oxford Playhouse.

Its main sponsor is Andersen Consulting, with clothing shops French Connection and Whistles sponsoring the costumes, all of which are up-to-the-minute, since the action has been moved to the present day.

The student players' aim is to reassert the importance of the play to our present-day society.

They say: "Its slippery societal criticism, presented with similarly elusive linguistics, makes it a very modern play. This modernity is reflected in the set design and costume, which combines contemporary design with many references to the characters' heritage. The director is Simon Woods, who was recently responsible for a well-received production of Abigail's Party at the Old Fire Station. He explained: "The Importance of Being Earnest is subtitled 'a trivial comedy for serious people'. It is also, I suppose, a serious comedy for trivial people. But what it is not is either a trivial comedy for trivial people, or a serious play for serious people. It refuses to be pinned down."

Included in the cast are Magdalen Senior Common Room member Susan Hitch, as the imperious Lady Bracknell, and (as Canon Chasuble) the Magdalen undergraduate Douglas Murray, who recently published the biography Bosie, a study of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas, another Magdalen man.

In the Magdalen College auditorium at 8.30pm tonight, James Walker and Ed Boase will perform their highly-acclaimed play Borne to be Wilde.

The drama tells the story of Oscar Wilde's youngest son, Vyvyan Holland, who was forced to stalk the continent as a child, banished from his country and separated from his father by the judgements of Victorian society.