Obsessed with a girl called Sylvia, whom he kissed just once at a garden party when he was 17, Mark makes a habit of pursuing physically identical girls for the rest of his life - despite having a wife and growing son. We meet him - and Oscar, his fellow philanderer - in 1917, again in 1929, and finally in 1950, each time in thrall to a different but identical ‘Sylvia' … This is probably Rattigan's bittersweet portayal of his father - and maybe of his own frustrated love life.
