Whether you have or have not seen Michael Frayn’s amusingly crafted farce Noises Off before will likely determine whether Roundabout Theater’s current revival will put a smile or a frown on your face. Be forewarned that more than one encounter with its madcap doings is likely to diminish your appreciation. Therefore my negative response to this production is based largely on seeing an ensemble of expert farceurs led astray by a director who apparently doesn’t believe that less is more.
In Noises Off we are transported to the stage of the Grand Theater in Weston-super-Mare, England. Originally produced on Broadway in 1983 with a subsequent revival in 2001, we again find ourselves planted in the middle of a sex farce called “Nothing On.”
A second-rate (to give them more credit than they deserve) troupe of actors is attempting, during a final frantic dress rehearsal, to tie up the loose ends (too many to list here) before curtain time. Helping them do just that is Lloyd Dallas (played with a formidably tortured tolerance by Campbell Scott). Tortured intolerance is, however, what I was feeling as I tried to respond to the inanities that ensue. Forgive me if I feel it still isn’t the uproarious entertainment that its premise suggests. However, we can not put any of the blame for any lapses of fun on this A-list cast.
The play’s action subsequently moves to the company’s next stop on its provincial tour, viewed from a backstage perspective. Animosities, hurt feelings, misunderstandings, and a general disregard for their performing art become for Frayn’s imbecilic characters a zany excuse for a silent-movie-style charade of pratfalls, booby traps, and cleverly executed sight gags that spill over directly to the performance in progress.
As you might expect, innumerable bedroom, closet, and other extraneous doors have one thing in common, their faulty knobs, latches, and hinges. These are the attention-grabbing devices in designer Derek McLane’s impressively made-for-traveling set that reveals the living room of the Brent’s country home as well as the area directly behind the set in the half following the intermission.
But be prepared for diminishing returns. That is unless you are tickled by the inevitable appearance and disappearance of naughty lingerie and fallen trousers, the split-second entrances and exits, as well as missed cues and misplaced props. Not to be upstaged is an increasingly menacing plate of sardines, a treacherous cactus plant, and an almost animated telephone receiver, that have all been called into service.
The fun of this type of farce is to watch the characters respond to the utter confusion in which they become engulfed. Out to get each other short of murder most foul, the troupe in the final scene is about to give a Wednesday matinee during the last leg of its tour. As members of the audience at the Municipal Theater, Stockton-On-Ties, we finally get to see a “regular” performance of “Nothing On,” as it hurtles toward self-destruction.
In charge is British director Jeremy Herrin, whose last effort on Broadway was the dull-as-dishwater English history Wolf Hall. In contrast, he has shaped this farce too broadly even on its own terms and allows the play’s repetitive, protracted scenes overwhelm the best efforts of the actors. He succumbs to all the pitfalls in the purposefully booby-trapped script and fails to do right by the stellar cast. The wonderful Tony Award-winner Andrea Martin has been sadly and heedlessly led astray as Dotty Otley, the troupe’s producer who is concurrently playing the role of a maid and having an affair with the juvenile lead. She sets the misguidedly over-the-top tone for the others as a close-to-senile bundle of insecurities.
Abetting the valiant Ms Martin with even less flair mostly involving back-stage flings are David Furr, as Garry Lejeune, Dotty’s romantic interest, who can’t complete a thought or a sentence; Megan Hilty, as Brooke Ashton, the director’s ditsy girlfriend, who drops her dress as frequently as her contact lenses; and Tracee Chimo, as Poppy Norton-Taylor, the harried stage manager and director’s ex-love interest. Rob McClure, however, is rather endearing as Tim Algood, the terminally nonplused put upon assistant stage manager cum understudy, as is Jeremy Shamos, as the dimwitted Frederick Fellow, who keeps insisting on plausible motivations for his character.
Although Kate Jennings Grant is less than grand as Belinda Blair, the company’s irrefutable grande dame, Daniel Davis (making his Roundabout debut) is a trifle grander as the alcoholic old trouper who wanders through the action with dazed senile assurance, a state that will undoubtedly be recognizable to more than a few members of the audience. I suspect it will take a few drinks before the show to put even a dazed smile on your face.
