DEAR LIAR:  ***** (out of 5 stars)
Spiegeltent, two hours, one intermission, ends Sept. 27. By Jerome Kilty. Adapted from the correspondence between Bernard Shaw and Mrs. Patrick Campbell. Created and performed by Marla McLean and Graeme Somerville.

Forty years of passionate correspondence took place between “Joey,” George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) and “Stella,” the renowned actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell (1865-1940).

Playwright Jerome Kilty’s “Dear Liar” probes their complex relationship through their written words of love, professional collaboration and fascination with one another.

As a theatre and music critic, Shaw had followed Mrs. Campbell’s career on stage, often with glowing but not always complimentary reviews.

Once he met her, it was love at first sight. Both had big egos, sharp wit and intelligence. Conflicts, pain, disagreements, opinions, silences and friendship were complicated by their marriages to others.

Instead of the philosophical, social justice advocacy expected by Shavians, Shaw’s written letters and conversations with the independent Mrs. Campbell reveal other surprising dimensions of his character and life.

“Why do you go on scolding me for the woman I am?” she wrote.

“I will forgive, bless, humour and adore you … for you, I wear my head nearest the sky,” he responded.

Shaw’s wife, Charlotte Payne-Townshend, a wealthy Irish political activist, tolerated his infatuation and friendship with Stella Tanner. She nursed him when ill, assisted him by typing his plays and protected him from intrusions while writing in his backyard cabin.

Stella became a widow when her husband, Patrick Campbell, died in the British Army cavalry charge at Boshof, South Africa, during the Second Boer War of 1900.

She kept her married stage name and in 1914, without warning to a deeply wounded Shaw, married the younger George Cornwallis-West whose first wife was Lady Randolph Churchill, the American Jennie Jerome, mother of Winston Churchill.

Three years later, Mrs. Campbell suffered the loss of her only son, Alan Urquhart Campbell, killed in action in 1917 in northern France.

Shaw wrote numerous plays specifically with Mrs. Campbell in mind including “The Apple Cart,” “Caesar and Cleopatra” and “The Devil’s Disciple.”

But it was their collaboration on “Pygmalion” in 1914, and her originating role as Eliza Doolittle, that would be the most enduring success. Even at 49, Mrs. Campbell triumphed as Eliza in London and New York.

She continued performing and touring in the U.S. until the last five years of her life. Her opportunities declined with age and her refusal to accept lesser parts. At the same time, Shaw’s plays and writings continued an upward trajectory to fame, including the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925.

Mrs. Campbell kept their letters close to her in a hatbox until her death in Pau, France, in 1940. Shaw had returned her letters but refused her appeal to publish them when she needed money.

He was concerned about the impact on his wife and on his reputation. They were published posthumously in 1952, two years after his death.

Marla McLean as Campbell and Graeme Somerville as Shaw provide a master class of superb performance. They attain a depth of understanding, both emotional and intellectual, conveying the vulnerability, pain, intimacy, frustrations, affection and duelling nature of their characters.

They excel as they bring decades of experience as actors at the Shaw, educators at the National Theatre School and their real-life relationship as husband and wife. They inhabit their roles with tremendous insight and sensitivity. The focused pacing and dialogue are mesmerizing.

The intimacy of the Spiegeltent space and our proximity to the actors as they physically circle, bob and weave between their two desks and chairs works brilliantly. This is not a static read but a lived experience of minds and bodies in motion both intellectually and physically.

This new production of “Dear Liar,” in the words of artistic director Tim Carroll, offers a “ginger up to the Shavian palate.” It’s a gourmet experience not to be missed.

Penny-Lynn Cookson is an arts and culture historian, writer and lecturer living in Niagara-on-the-Lake.