The Duke in the Cupboard @ Halifax Playhouse

The Halifax Thespians present The Duke In The Cupboard

Tuesday 10 to Saturday 14 June at 7:30pm & 2:30pm Saturday matinee

On 2 August 1961, Goya’s portrait of the Duke of Wellington, which had been saved for the nation by a special treasury grant, was put on display at The National Gallery in

London. Nineteen days later it was stolen.

Four years after the theft, Kempton Bunton, a 61-year-old unemployed former bus driver from Benwell, Newcastle, baffled Scotland Yard detectives by confessing to the theft.

Had this heavily built, antisocial, bespectacled Geordie really outwitted the gallery’s sophisticated security? The case sparked a national sensation and Susan Wear wrote the play after reading secret Director of Public Prosecution papers relating to the case. The recent film version starred Jim Broadbent and Helen Mirren.