What will they say at Brompton? A Comedetta, in One Act

In Short

This 1857 Victorian comedietta follows Samuel Todd, a comfortable suburbanite preparing for an Italian holiday with his resolute wife, Laura. Terrified by a relative’s gruesome tales of foreign travel, Todd falls asleep over an opium cigar and dreams he is stranded in the Italian mountains. In his nightmare, he mourns his supposedly drowned wife, gets captured by robbers, and is forced into a deadly second marriage. Waking back in his Brompton parlour, he embraces domestic routine with newfound relief. The play endures as a sharp, absurd parody of mid-nineteenth-century British insular fear and melodramatic theatrical conventions.

The Story

The play opens in Cozy Cottage, Brompton, where packing for a grand tour of the Continent is in full, chaotic swing. Mrs. Laura Todd frantically manages the luggage while her husband, Samuel, attempts to navigate their journey using a baffling copy of Bradshaw’s Railway Guide. Samuel prefers contemplative repose to actual labor, taking time to practice "My Mary Ann" on his concertina, which he hopes will impress foreign audiences. Their preparations are interrupted by Laura’s uncle, Mr. Croker, a relentless prophet of doom. Croker gleefully regales the couple with horrific tales of travel disasters, including fatal steamboat crossings, alpine avalanches, extortionist innkeepers, and bloodthirsty Italian brigands who shoot English tourists.

While Laura remains unbothered by her uncle’s warnings, Samuel is thoroughly unnerved. Left alone in the parlour after his wife goes to bed, he lights a cigarette and quickly falls into a heavy sleep. The stage scenery sinks to reveal Samuel’s dream: a ruined, atmospheric palace in the Abruzzi. Dressed in mourning clothes with pistols in his belt, Samuel adopts the persona of "Signor Toddini," claiming his beloved Laura drowned in the Bay of Genoa. He encounters Marietta, the niece of the infamous brigand chief Jacopo Terreboli. Samuel believes Marietta falls for his charms, but his self-delusion is short-lived.

Jacopo arrives and traps Samuel. Admiring the Englishman's supposed bravado during an earlier ambush, the robber chief demands that Samuel marry Marietta to preserve her honor and become second-in-command of the band. To make matters worse, Jacopo’s jealous lieutenant, Grimbaldi, secretly threatens to murder Samuel with a stiletto if the wedding takes place, while Marietta threatens to poison him. Caught between Jacopo’s pistol, Grimbaldi’s dagger, and Marietta’s poison, a terrified Samuel agrees to the ceremony.

Immediately after the forced nuptials, Laura miraculously appears in the robber's lair, very much alive and searching for her husband. Discovering that Samuel has remarried after only three months of supposed widowhood, she furiously confronts him for bigamy. Before the marital dispute can be settled, a brigand bursts in to announce that government troops are surrounding the hideout. Jacopo orders the palace set on fire and flees with the women, leaving Samuel trapped. As flames engulf the room and Grimbaldi taunts him from a rope ladder, Samuel leaps up in terror.

He awakens abruptly in his own parlour at Cozy Cottage. The candles have burned down, and Laura is shaking him awake as the morning doorbell rings. Relieved to discover that his terrifying adventures in bigamy and arson were merely the result of an opium-laden cigar, Samuel happily embraces his wife and prepares for their journey.

How It Unfolds

The journey begins in chaos In a cluttered Brompton parlour, Laura Todd packs trunks while Samuel tries to decipher an impossible train itinerary. Their domestic routine is interrupted by Uncle Croker, who fills Samuel's head with morbid stories of violent accidents and mountain robbers awaiting them abroad.

A descent into nightmare Left alone late at night, Samuel falls asleep over his desk and sinks through the stage into a dark dream world. He finds himself in a ruined Italian palace, adopting a fraudulent persona and claiming his wife drowned at sea.

Entangled with brigands Samuel meets Marietta, only to be captured by her uncle, the ruthless bandit leader Jacopo Terreboli. Jacopo misinterprets Samuel's panicked clumsiness as heroic bravery and forces him into an immediate marriage with Marietta under threat of death.

Surrounded by peril The forced wedding draws threats of revenge from a jealous rival, while Marietta promises to poison her new groom. To make matters worse, Laura suddenly appears in the hideout, catching Samuel in an apparent act of bigamy.

Escape to reality As soldiers attack, the brigands set the castle on fire and abandon Samuel to burn. He awakens screaming in his comfortable home, realizing the entire ordeal was an opium-induced nightmare, and cheerfully reconciles with his wife.

The People

• Samuel Todd: A lazy, timid suburban husband who retreats into romantic fantasies and concertina playing. He wants a tranquil life without physical exertion, but his anxiety makes him vulnerable to terrifying nightmares of foreign danger.

• Mrs. Laura Todd: A practical, resolute woman of energetic action. She wants to see the Continent and refuses to let doom-saying relatives or her husband's cowardice derail her travel plans.

• Mr. Croker: Laura’s gloom-obsessed uncle. He takes morbid pleasure in dampening the couple's spirits by reciting gruesome tales of shipwrecks, avalanches, and highway robbery.

• Jacopo Terreboli: A fierce Italian brigand chief in Samuel's dream. He wants a brave successor for his bandit crew and aggressively forces Samuel to marry his niece.

• Marietta: Jacopo’s sharp-tongued niece. Trapped in her uncle’s solitary lair, she wants to protect her secret lover and threatens to poison Samuel if he obeys her uncle.

• Grimbaldi: A grim, jealous major-domo in the bandit hideout who brandishes a stiletto and vows murderous vengeance against Samuel for stealing Marietta.

In Its Own Voice

"My dear Laura, there’s the difference between us—you’re remarkable for physical energy—I for contemplative repose."

Samuel deflects his wife's requests for help with packing by praising his own laziness while struggling to read a train schedule.

"What would they say at Brompton if we went to Margate, with a passport for Naples?"

Laura refuses to cancel their European holiday, valuing suburban social prestige over her uncle's dire warnings.

"In my country, ever since the invention of doors, the practice of entering a house by the window has been confined to thieves, cats, and lovers..."

Trapped in his nightmare, Samuel attempts to flirt with a bandit's niece after climbing a rope ladder into her room.

What It's Really About

The play parodies mid-nineteenth-century British xenophobic anxieties and suburban conformity. Samuel Todd's nightmare synthesizes every dramatic cliché of the Victorian stage—mysterious ruins, tragic drownings, vengeful brigands, forced marriages, and sudden fires—exposing them as absurd fabrications fed by insular fear.

The title highlights the central psychological driver of the characters: the terror of public opinion in respectable English suburbs like Brompton. Laura insists on facing real physical danger rather than enduring local gossip about a canceled trip, while Samuel worries about suburban propriety even when facing execution in a robber's den. Ultimately, the piece mocks the fragile bravado of middle-class tourists who crave foreign exoticism but remain utterly unequipped to handle anything outside their comfortable routine.

Why Read It Today

This short farce offers a lively window into 1850s popular theater, capturing the precise moment when Victorian middle-class tourists began venturing onto the Continent in large numbers. It will appeal to readers interested in nineteenth-century comedy, theatrical history, and satire of bourgeois manners.

The play moves at a frantic, slapstick pace, relying heavily on stage business, rapid costume changes, and dramatic scene shifts. Its brevity makes for a quick, entertaining read, though modern audiences must navigate some period-specific pop culture references—such as jokes about Bradshaw’s guides, Albert Smith’s lectures, and popular songs of the day like "My Mary Ann."

What lingers after reading is the sharp contrast between cozy domesticity and outrageous melodrama. Coyne cleverly uses the dream structure to let his everyday suburban anti-hero play out wildly exaggerated romantic fantasies, only to deliver him back to the safety of tea, carpet bags, and morning police calls.