A bedroom farce or sex farce is a type of light

comedy Comedy is a genre of dramatic works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. Origins Comedy originated in ancient Greec ...

focusing on the sexual pairings and recombinations of characters as they move through improbable plots and slamming doors.

Overview

Georges Feydeau Georges-Léon-Jules-Marie Feydeau (; 8 December 1862 – 5 June 1921) was a French playwright of the Belle Époque era, remembered for his farces, written between 1886 and 1914. Feydeau was born in Paris to middle-class parents and raised in a ...

plays, presented in Paris in the 1890s, are considered forerunners. The

Viennese Viennese may refer to: * Vienna, the capital of Austria * Viennese people, List of people from Vienna * Viennese German, the German dialect spoken in Vienna * Viennese classicism * Viennese coffee house, an eating establishment and part of Viennese ...

playwright

Arthur Schnitzler Arthur Schnitzler (15 May 1862 – 21 October 1931) was an Austrian author and dramatist. He is considered one of the most significant representatives of Viennese Modernism. Schnitzler’s works, which include psychological dramas and narratives ...

took bedroom farce to its highest dramatic level in his '' La Ronde'', which in ten bedroom scenes connect the highest and lowest of Vienna. Some of the English

Aldwych farce The Aldwych farces were a series of twelve stage farces presented at the Aldwych Theatre, London, nearly continuously from 1923 to 1933. All but three of them were written by Ben Travers. They incorporate and develop British low comedy styles ...

s by

Ben Travers Ben Travers (12 November 188618 December 1980) was an English writer. His output includes more than 20 plays, 30 screenplays, 5 novels, and 3 volumes of memoirs. He is most notable for his long-running series of farces first staged in the 19 ...

which were popular in the 1920s and 1930s have aspects of "bedroom farce", e.g. ''

A Cuckoo in the Nest ''A Cuckoo in the Nest'' is a farce by the English playwright Ben Travers. It was first given at the Aldwych Theatre, London, the second in the series of twelve Aldwych farces presented by the actor-manager Tom Walls at the theatre between 1923 ...

'' or ''Rookery Nook''. However, in each case the sharing of a bedroom or house turns out to have an innocent explanation. In modern times,

Woody Allen Heywood Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30, 1935) is an American filmmaker, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades. Allen has received many List of awards and nominations received by Woody Allen, accolade ...

's ''

A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy ''A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy'' is a 1982 American sex comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen, starring Allen and Mia Farrow. The plot is loosely based on Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman's 1955 comedy film '' Smiles of a Summer Nig ...

'' (1982) presents aspects of the bedroom farce.

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 (play), Copenhagen'' and ''Democracy (play), Democracy''. Frayn's novel ...

's 1977 play ''

Donkeys' Years ''Donkeys' Years'' is a play by English playwright Michael Frayn that premiered at the Globe Theatre, London, in 1976. The play is a West End farce Farce is a comedy that seeks to entertain an audience through situations that are highly e ...

'' is a classic bedroom farce; Frayn parodied the genre in his 1982 play ''

Noises Off ''Noises Off'' is a 1982 farce 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 funni ...

'' via its play-within-the-play, "Nothing On."

Alan Ayckbourn Sir Alan Ayckbourn (born 12 April 1939) is a prolific British playwright and director. As of 2025, he has written and produced 90 full-length plays in Scarborough and London and was, between 1972 and 2009, the artistic director of the Stephen ...

's play, entitled ''Bedroom Farce'', looks at the lives of three couples seen in their own bedrooms, the stage being split into three sets for this purpose. There is much humour in the play, although few if any of the usual conventions of farce are observed. '' Boeing Boeing'' is a classic French farce for the stage by Marc Camoletti. Utilizing most of the conventions of bedroom farce's canon, it concerns a Parisian bachelor playboy with three international air stewardess fiancées he secretly keeps in careful rotation, until their flight schedules change and he, along with his provincial friend and sassy maid, must keep them from finding out about each other. Luckily they have enough doors in the apartment to keep the girls unwittingly flitting about for two hours. American three-camera situation comedy, an extension of proscenium stage tradition, often includes elements of farce, specifically in several episodes of ''

Three's Company ''Three's Company'' is an American television sitcom that aired for eight seasons on ABC from March 15, 1977, to September 18, 1984. Developed by Don Nicholl, Michael Ross and Bernie West, it is based on the British sitcom '' Man About the ...

'', the "Woody's Wedding" episode of ''

Cheers ''Cheers'' is an American television sitcom, created by Glen and Les Charles, Glen Charles & Les Charles and James Burrows, that aired on NBC for eleven seasons from September 30, 1982, to May 20, 1993. The show was produced by Charles/Burrows/C ...

'', " The Ski Lodge" episode of ''

Frasier ''Frasier'' () is an American television sitcom that was broadcast on NBC for 11 seasons from September 16, 1993, to May 13, 2004. The program was created and produced by David Angell, Peter Casey (screenwriter), Peter Casey, and David Lee (scr ...

'', and the " Love Car Displacement" episode of ''

The Big Bang Theory ''The Big Bang Theory'' is an American television sitcom created by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady for CBS. It aired from September 24, 2007, to May 16, 2019, running for 12 seasons and 279 episodes. The show originally centered on five charact ...

''. Brian Rix performed many bedroom farces at the Garrick theatre in London, many of which were broadcast by the BBC. British dramatist

Ray Cooney Raymond George Alfred Cooney Order of the British Empire, OBE (born 30 May 1932) is an English playwright, actor, and director. His biggest success, ''Run for Your Wife (play), Run for Your Wife'' (1983), ran for nine years in London's West E ...

, whose ''Run For Your Wife'' was the longest running-comedy in

West End theater West End theatre is mainstream professional theatre staged in the large theatres in and near the West End of London.Christopher Innes"West End"in ''The Cambridge Guide to Theatre'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 1194–1195, ...

history, is a modern master of this genre.

References

Comedy theatre Comedy genres {{Theat-stub

Overview

See also

References