Our insatiable appetite for the real story behind the play or the movie–the shenanigans, the jealousy and the love affairs–is more than happily satisfied in Michael Frayn’s deliciously funny ‘Noises Off,’ now on stage through May 11 at Pierson Playhouse, 941 Temescal Canyon Rd. With spot-on direction by Sherman Wayne, the Theatre Palisades cast has landed a winner, having triumphed over the notorious challenges that farce presents. The great English actress Edith Evans once summed it up with. ‘In a farce, you don’t have a play to help you.’ Success depends on the stuff of farce, namely its extreme physical and comic appeal, and unerring timing. That Theatre Palisades took on this challenge is remarkable, but we’re glad the company did. In a nutshell, the conceit concerns staging a play, so not only is the ‘business’ among the actors funny, but the play-within-the play itself is unbearably bad, and thus hilarious. It’s difficult for good actors to play ‘bad,’ but this troupe pulls it off, squeezing out the most from Frayn’s smart, situational bon mots, which blessedly don’t rely on knowledge of the latest headlines or celebrity scandal. We start right off in Act I with a rehearsal of ‘Nothing On,’ the aforementioned faux play, which we soon learn is scheduled to open the next night. The set, wonderfully conceived by Wayne, with help from the Theatre Palisades production staff, recreates the living room of the Brents’ English country home. A silent partner in this whole game, the set, equipped with the multiple doors, is a must in the structure of farcical antics. Housekeeper Mrs. Clackett (Martha Hunter) as caretaker is the fulcrum for the humorous antics that ensue. Hopelessly scatterbrained, she is constrained by the director (Craig Christiansen), whose hopeless reminders of a missed cue become the stuff of pratfall and general mayhem. He has already let her off the hook for the text: ‘Don’t worry about the words, love,’ he assures her. The house is for lease and thus empty, which opens up the possibilities for opportunists, surreptitious trysters and idle burglars. By the end of Act I, we audience members are grateful for intermission, having laughed ourselves to near-exhaustion. Act II finds us repeating the rehearsal, but this time from behind the stage so we get to see exactly what goes on behind the scenes. Everything under the sun. There is the two-timing director, the ing’nue with the wandering contact lens, the drunken burglar’the usual slice-of-life comedy. By Act III, when we see opening night, the hilarity has reached full bloom. The actors, by this time sick of the play and one another, slug through, ‘on we bloody stagger, on we blindly stumble.’ The acting is uniformly exceptional, as it must be in ensemble work. Martha Hunter seems to thrive in over-the-top characters, much to the audience’s delight. Craig Christiansen, who plays the ‘director,’ lends necessary straight-man solidity, which, of course, is funny. Costumer Joyce Gale Smith must have had a ball dressing her wacky players in everything from country club sport to ‘Sheik of Araby’ sheets! ‘Noises Off’ continues Friday, Saturday and Sunday through May 11. For tickets, call (310) 454-1970.
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