''Donkeys' Years'' is a play by English playwright

Michael Frayn Michael Frayn, FRSL (; born 8 September 1933) is an English playwright and novelist. He is best known as the author of the farce '' Noises Off'' and the dramas ''Copenhagen'' and ''Democracy''. His novels, such as '' Towards the End of the M ...

that premiered at the Globe Theatre, London, in 1976. The play is a West End farce, a genre that Frayn parodied five years later in his

play within a play A story within a story, also referred to as an embedded narrative, is a literary device in which a character within a story becomes the narrator of a second story (within the first one). Multiple layers of stories within stories are sometimes c ...

"Nothing On" from ''

Noises Off ''Noises Off'' is a 1982 play by the English playwright Michael Frayn. Frayn conceived the idea in 1970 while watching from the wings a performance of '' The Two of Us'', a farce that he had written for Lynn Redgrave. He said, "It was funnier ...

''. In ''Donkeys' Years'' six former students spend the weekend at their old university college for their 25th year reunion. The wife of the Master of the college becomes locked within its walls for the night, supplying the material for a classic bedroom farce. A Government minister is placed in a series of embarrassing positions. The play featured

Penelope Keith Dame Penelope Anne Constance Keith, (née Hatfield; born 2 April 1940) is an English actress and presenter, active in film, radio, stage and television and primarily known for her roles in the British sitcoms '' The Good Life'' and '' To the M ...

, who subsequently won the 1976 Olivier Award for Best Comedy Performance. The play was revived in 2006 at the

Comedy Theatre The Harold Pinter Theatre, known as the Comedy Theatre until 2011,

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Further reading