Oscar Wilde's play, over 100 years old, seems as resonant and topical today as ever. In recent years, several prominent British politicians (most notably Jonathan Aitken) have been caught out in exactly the same way as Chiltern. The story, first brought to the screen by Alexander Korda back in 1947, continues to inspire film and stage directors alike. Peter Hall recently directed a version of it at the Old Vic Theatre in London while Bill Cartlidge has just finished his own movie adaptation. Oliver Parker's stab at Wilde is set in 1895. "It's an adaptation of the period text," explains executive-producer Andrea Calderwood, "but done with a contemporary interpretation."

Jeremy Northam (who also appears in David Mamet's Cannes entry, The Winslow Boy) plays Chiltern. Cate Blanchett is his devoted wife, Minnie Driver co-stars as Sir Robert's sister and Julianne Moore is the femme fatale, Mrs Cheveley, who threatens to blow their lives apart.

It's Rupert Everett, though, who gets the best lines. He plays man-about-town Arthur Goring, a character who, beneath his foppish exterior, is both witty and wise. An Ideal Husband, already a box-office hit in the UK, is co-funded by Pathé (under the terms of its Arts Council production franchise) and Icon Entertainment. It's certainly a departure for producer Barnaby Thompson of Fragile Films, whose most recent previous credit was Spiceworld The Movie. An Ideal Husband isn't the first stage-play that writer-director Oliver Parker has made. His debut feature was an adaptation of Shakespeare's Othello with Laurence Fishburne as the Moor. Jerry Hazard