Pittsburgh Irish & Classical Theatre begins its series of Oscar Wilde plays with a delightful production of "An Ideal Husband." It's crisp and lively and embraces all of the play's best qualities -- its witty language and juicy characters.

"An Ideal Husband" begins at Lady Chiltern's dinner party, a purportedly dull affair that everyone must attend to complain about how boring it is. The first taste of Wilde's lampooning of the British upper class comes in the utterly frivolous conversation between the Countess of Basildon and Mrs. Marchmont, played with a sparkling yet understated sense of playfulness by Catherine Moore and Mary Rawson, who skillfully volley Wilde's epigrams on the distastefulness of education and serious purpose.

"An Ideal Husband," though dismissive of serious purpose in Wilde's typical lighthearted preference for form over substance, has its share of significant themes. Its story is shaped by the melodrama of its time (being first produced in 1895), although Wilde takes a more ironic approach. There's a secret letter that has the power to destroy a career, an evil femme fatale who will seemingly stop at nothing to have her way, a sweet, loving and moral wife, and a charming wastrel who plays the reluctant hero.

These stock characters and stock situations shift unexpectedly in Wilde's hands. The loving wife, Lady Chiltern, learns that morality must be tempered by forgiveness. The evil beauty, Mrs. Cheveley, is indeed defeated, but the resultant happy ending isn't a simple re-establishment of the old moral order. Instead, Wilde hints at a new type of marriage, one in which the "real" supersedes the "ideal," especially for the shallow hero, Lord Goring, and his young love, Mabel.

Director Andrew A. Paul has assembled a wonderful cast, led by Paul Todaro as Lord Goring. Todaro has been a PICT regular for three seasons now, last seen as Edmund in "King Lear." Here, he's smart and appealing and tempers the sentimentality of Goring with just a bit of nastiness, making Goring a suitable sparring partner for the cunning Mrs. Cheveley.

As Mrs. Cheveley, Nike Doukas is as smooth and cool and tempting as glittering gold. She's a villain so magnetic she almost wins you to her side. And Doukas pulls off Mrs. Cheveley's most melodramatic speeches with delicious malevolence.

Wilde doesn't make the Chilterns nearly as interesting, but David Whalen and Beth Hylton as Sir Robert and Lady Chiltern add complexity to their characters, so that the fate of the Chilterns' marriage merits attention.

Anwen Darcy is bright and appealing as Sir Robert's sister, Mabel, her insouciance a good match for Todaro's flippant Lord Goring.

Wilde fills out the social circle with servants (played with discreet disdain by E. Bruce Hill, Dek Ingraham and James FitzGerald), relatives (Jay Keenan's gruff and bumbling Earl of Caversham) and other associates. One of the most memorable, thanks largely to an amazing performance by Kathleen Huber, is Lady Markby, who bemoans the trials of the old ways of life and sniffles dismissively at the new.

In the small Henry Heymann Theatre, scenic designer Gianni Downs has limited space in which to create Wilde's lavish, elegant world. Instead, Downs pulls the focus to a repeated mural of a watchful female eye, which sits in constant moral judgment of the entire affair.

Much of the design budget seems to have gone to the costumes. Joan Markert's dresses are stunning, a colorful array of decadent couture.

"An Ideal Husband" isn't performed nearly as often as Wilde's masterpiece, "The Importance of Being Earnest," and this is an ideal opportunity to see it in all its splendor.