A one-man show coming to Guildford is two tributes in one - to Oscar Wilde, and to the actor who championed him 60 years after his death.

Wilde became famous for his literary works, including The Importance of Being Earnest, then found himself imprisoned for two years because of late 19th century British attitudes to homosexuality.

On his release he sailed to France, never to return to the British Isles, and produced his final work - The Ballad of Reading Gaol - in 1898. He died in Paris two years later of meningitis, aged 46.

In 1960 actor Micheál Mac Liammóir, born a year before Oscar Wilde’s death, wrote The Importance of Being Oscar, a one-man oral biography of Wilde’s life and work, which he performed more than 1,300 times until 1976.

Alastair Whatley will perform it at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre on May 15 at 7.30pm, and May 16 at 2.30pm and 7.30pm.

He said of Micheál’s original version: “It was like the summoning of the spirit of Oscar Wilde. It’s his life and work, and Micheál narrated in between, but even the narration is beautiful.

‘You get the early poetry, Earnest, then the extraordinary letter to his lover Bosie Douglas. It was on the edge of what the censor in Catholic Ireland would allow in the 1960s.

“Micheál never says Wilde was a gay man but he presses and probes around the edges, so there is extraordinary tension in the play.

“We conjure the ghosts of Wilde and Micheál. There are very much two presences in the room and we weave the ghosts.

“When this play was first done it was part of what rehabilitated Wilde’s reputation. It’s a privilege to do it.”

For tickets, priced from £29 (concessions from £24), call 01483 440000 or visit www.yvonne-arnaud.co.uk