Try as I might to muster an "academic" theater review for Live Arts' recent production of Noises Off, I think doing so would be misleading. Not only would such a piece awkwardly attempt to unpack all the meta-theatrical depth that can certainly be found in the play, it would ignore one important fact about the purportedly unbiased reviewer: I don't like British comedy.
Hold on to your knickers, you BBC-watching, Signals catalogue-shopping, Bean-loving readers. I just thought I ought to be transparent about my pre-dispositions against the genre. (Not to mention the almost automatic sense of artificiality I get the moment I hear an American putting on a British accent.)
Despite this, Noises Off won me over. The main comedic fodder is slapstick, sexual innuendo, wordplay and blundering stupidity, but there's actually more to love about the show, even for a colonial like me.
Noises Off is a play within a play. It is 1982, and a British acting troupe is touring Nothing On, a contrived farce which seems to represent theater's lowest low. The caustic director, Lloyd, describes Nothing On as being about "doors and sardines."
In the first act, the company has only a few hours to get it together and open the show. The actor stereotypes that emerge here (Think: "What's my motivation?") are hilarious, and the director's superiority complex rears its head with funny results: "And God saw that it was terrible."
The second and third acts occur a few months down the road -- the company is still performing the terrible play, but the drama is hotter behind the scenes. The intersecting love affairs of this motley group of actors eventually lead the veneer of the shoddy play to crumble altogether.
Act two is my favorite. The entire set is flipped around, and we get the actors' view of the backstage area. We also get the most relatable picture of the broken hearts which propel the show that must go on. Do yourself a favor and stay in the house for the second intermission to watch the set get flipped back to its original layout -- now that's great drama.
My other favorite parts are, unfortunately, the intermissions. Despite the frequent hilarity, each act reaches a crescendo and plateaus -- a nonstop stream of extremely well-choreographed but intense British humor. The lack of respite made the two breaks as necessary to this play as hats to the Queen Mum.
Despite the hurtling tempo, the show has many virtues. It is flawlessly cast, each actor perfectly embodying his or her "type" and carrying it throughout. The potentially-confusing nature of the Noises Off/Nothing On distinction is obviously well-understood by the ensemble. Not to mention all the organization that goes into making a show that's so chaotic. Just for its mechanics, this production is engaging and applause-worthy.
Several audience members were laughing throughout -- taste willing, you'll be one of them. Yet even I, the stiff-lipped American (I believe that's the stereotype), was laughing pretty riotously in places. Some of the humor may have even rubbed off. Indeed, I'd say Noises Off is better than a cup of tea and a plate of sardines. It's not life-changing stuff, but it's funny. If you like that sort of thing.
Noises Off is playing through Oct. 15.
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