New comedy play takes its cue from Marx Brothers

Doppel Gang to be staged at Buxton's Pavilion Arts Centre on Ocdtober 8, 2015

A new comedy play inspired by the legendary Marx Brothers will stop off in Buxton as part of a nationwide tour.

The Doppel Gang, which comes to the Pavilion Arts Centre, on October 8, combines the wild wit of The Marx Brothers – Groucho, Harpo and Chico – with generous helpings of British humour and humility.

Playwright Dominic Hedges commented: “There are so many similarities between our comedy and that of our American cousins. We both think we’re hilarious and we both think we’re smarter than one another. Groucho Marx’s lightning wit vs Eric Morecambe’s wry asides for instance.”

The play is set in wartime when a group of entertainers battle to save a theatre from closure by masquerading as The Marx Brothers. As the Blitz tears through London, a hopeless theatre manager persuades a desperate double act and not-so-convincing male impersonator to join him in an audacious stunt to save his building and boost morale.

The curtain is about to rise, but so are the stakes as an unprecedented series of revelations leads to an exhilarating chain of events. Will anyone believe they are the real Marx Brothers?