In a "black box" used to present four plays a day for each of three or (in this case) four days a week, staging must needs be simple. But Michel B. Company's Knock, that relies on props rather than scenery, is simple-minded. Burlesquing a period satire that's still effective as written, inserting "Pink Panther" and similar music, and caricaturing already broad characters don't go down smoothly. For no apparent reason, except perhaps that the troupe is mostly female, Marie Burvingt assumes a queerly-accented deep voice, as well as man's black suit to alternate in the role of Doctor (as he insists on being called) "Knock."
A charlatan, he arrives in provincial Saint-Maurice to assume the practice of the local doctor, who's off to Lyon to make a decent living. Knock soon enlists the aid of the town drummer who announces news (here a village idiot with electrified hair), the school teacher (who's persuaded to promote hygiene with exaggerated pix of germs and excrement), and the pharmacist Mousquette (a hunchbacked, B-movie Chinaman who typically cackles with Knock).
More fun should come from watching Knock make his patients sick. These include a rich and stingy eccentric, two slick guys who think they'll "take him," and a demoiselle in velvet boa and Madame Pompador wig. Unfortunately, all the doubling actors "knock" themselves out to little avail, including a "nurse" socialite and technician in the former's estate-turned-hospital. No wonder the last village doctor, back to collect another payment for his practice, is astounded. But Knock's not about to let him cancel their deal. He and his cohorts are marching (literally!) toward a medical center controlling the region.
Black-light technique points up the black comedy in another elaboration of the obvious.
