Folger Theatre is on a hot streak this season, one that continues with its latest production. Nell Gwynn, a love letter to the beloved English actress turned royal paramour, doesn’t spring from the Bard’s quill: It’s a recent work by playwright Jessica Swale. Originally staged across the pond in 2015, first at the Globe and then on London’s West End, this Olivier Award-winning comedy finally gets a proper East Coast staging. It’s fabulous, and well worth the wait.

Imagine a tart mix of Shakespeare in Love and A Star is Born, plopped in Restoration England (thus continuing a setting established by Davenant’s Macbeth, whose director, Robert Richmond, is also at the helm here). Nell, played by the enchanting and plucky Alison Luff, scrapes by as an orange hawker by day, a prostitute by night. The vain but generous Charles Hart (Quinn Franzen, a spitting image of Saturday Night Live’s Beck Bennett) is a famous player in a local troupe. He soon discovers a talented actor lies beneath Nell’s hardened exterior. She’s a celebrity in the making, a future marquee name in an era preceding Edison’s lightbulb.

Nell’s rise is as meteoric as it is pioneering: This is the first time women were allowed to perform onstage in Britain, a sea change Nell Gwynn’s funniest male character grapples with over and over again. The petite Edward Kynaston (Christopher Dinolfo, a scene-stealer) opposes the inclusion of actresses in the limelight, in the same way, two-and-a-half centuries later, silent film actors would scorn the talkies and their ascendant movie stars. His monopoly on lady-drag is suddenly, and hilariously, on the wane.

No one doubts Nell’s remarkable abilities. She even catches the eye of King Charles II (the effortlessly regal R.J. Foster) and becomes his favorite mistress. Charles is consumed with paralyzing doubt following the end of the Parliamentary government that executed his father after a bloody civil war. Plot beats accelerate at a quick clip after Nell finds herself entangled in politics and distracted from her work.

For all its palace intrigue, Nell Gwynn is only marginally interested in the statecraft it dramatizes. This, after all, is the title character’s story. Everything boils down to Nell—an innovator, our proto-superstar.

Folger’s treatment of Nell’s rise is both loving and resplendent. Crimson curtains frame the wooden stage. Mariah Anzaldo Hale’s luxurious costumes, worthy of haute couture catwalks, drape these characters, many of whom are knowingly silly. Majestic instrumentals, courtesy of Matt Otto, cue irreverent scene changes.

Nell Gwynn is a romantic comedy of the highest order: bawdy, biting and, in the end, dead serious. In other words, it’s Shakespearian. A perfect fit for this tiny and electric Capitol Hill playhouse.

Nell Gwynn runs at the Folger Theatre through March 10. Tickets $42-$79. Runtime approximately two hours and thirty minutes with one intermission.