Ben Travers

Ben Travers AFC CBE (12 November 1886 - 18 December 1980) was a British playwright most famous for his farces.

Born in the London borough of Hendon, Travers was educated at Charterhouse, where today there is a theatre named for him. After a brief sojourn in business, he served in the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service during the First World War. He also rejoined the Royal Air Force in 1939 as a Squadron Leader, being employed at the Air Ministry and in Washington.

Travers' first play "The Dippers" was produced in 1922 by Sir Charles Hawtrey. It was followed by his celebrated series of Farces staged at the Aldwych Theatre, and a number of well-received serious plays. Travers also wrote five novels, two autobiographies and a book of cricket reminiscences. In 1970 the BBC produced the farces Rookery Nook, A Cuckoo In The Nest, Turkey Time, A Cup Of Kindness, Plunder, Dirty Work and She Follows Me About for television. At the age of 83, Travers rewrote the plays to concentrate on plot twists and verbal misunderstandings, rather than the slapstick and split-second timing that typified the stage versions.

In his ninetieth year he wrote a "comeback" work for the stage, the comedy The Bed Before Yesterday, which was successfully produced by Lindsay Anderson in the West End in December 1975 for the Lyric Theatre Company, starring Joan Plowright and Helen Mirren. On Travers' 90th birthday, when asked in a radio interview whether he didn't feel that at 90 he was a bit old to be writing sex romps, he replied quick-as-a-flash "Ah but you see, I have an awfully good memory".

In January 1976 Michael Blakemore revived Plunder at the Royal National Theatre and at the Evening Standard Awards, held at the Savoy Hotel on 4 February, Travers was presented with the 1975 Special Award for his Services to the Theatre, and received the CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours.

He served as prime warden of the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers.

The Plays

• 1922 The Dippers
• 1924 The Three Graces (an adaptation)
• 1925 A Cuckoo in the Nest (adapted from his 1922 novel)
• 1926 Rookery Nook (adapted from his 1923 novel)
• 1927 Thark
• 1928 Plunder
• 1928 Mischief
• 1929 A Cup of Kindness
• 1930 A Night Like This
• 1931 Turkey Time
• 1932 Dirty Work
• 1933 A Bit of a Test
• 1936 Chastity, My Brother
• 1936 O Mistress Mine
• 1938 Banana Ridge
• 1939 Spotted Dick
• 1943 She Follows Me About
• 1947 Outrageous Fortune
• 1952 Wild Horses
• 1975 The Bed Before Yesterday
• 1980 After You With the Milk

References

Five Plays by Ben Travers, W. H. Allen 1977. 1979 Penguin reprint ISBN 014048146X