‘One Man, Two Guvnors’ makes zany ensemble magic at A Noise Inside

The festivities start even earlier than the characters of “One Man, Two Guvnors” enter the stage. A skiffle band (full with washboard participant) performs a pre-show set to rev up the viewers for this replace of a traditional farce relocated to Britain on the eve of the swinging ‘60s.

The inspiration for Richard Bean’s “One Man, Two Guvnors,” now at A Noise Inside in Pasadena, is “The Servant of Two Masters,” Carlo Goldoni’s mid-18th-century comedy that formalized the commedia dell’arte antics and masked characters made well-known by the improvisational Italian troupes of the day. Bean’s play, set within the eccentric seaside city of Brighton, is quintessentially English in contrast. However farce is a common language, and the hilarity is not only translated however alchemized into one thing riotously up to date.

Grant Olding has written the songs that set the play’s temper, a mischievous Joe Orton-esque ambiance, solely much less jaundiced and extra childlike. Francis Henshall (Kasey Mahaffy), a down-on-his luck busker who strikes by means of the world like an overgrown child, is pushed extra by starvation than lust, at the least within the play’s first half.

His raging urge for food compels him to interrupt the fourth wall and beg the viewers for a spare sandwich. When James Corden performed the function in London after which on Broadway (the place he received a Tony Award for his work), Francis grew to become a determine of unstoppable gluttony. Mahaffy, who starred within the exuberant revival of “A Man of No Significance” at A Noise Inside final season, is extra insistently peckish — hungry reasonably than hangry. Sustenance is obtainable — a hummus sandwich, not one of many character’s favorites — however the plot received’t permit him to dig in simply but. Poor Francis has no alternative however to gamely proceed with the farcical enterprise at hand.

“One Man, Two Guvnors” was so dominated by Corden’s star-making efficiency (this was earlier than his late-night talk-show days) that I assumed the play was a automobile for a no-holds-barred clown. The effectiveness of the brand new manufacturing, co-directed by Julia Rodriguez-Elliott and Geoff Elliott, is the ensemble method to the comedy, with everybody anticipated to contribute their fair proportion of mirth.

Mahaffy might not be essentially the most pure Zanni, the commedia time period for the trickster servant who’s riddled with starvation and lust and all the time ready to speak his method out of bother. He works laborious for his laughs, typically too laborious, however he’s an endearing imp — an overwhelmed freelancer making an attempt to outlive the unforgiving gig economic system of his age.

When the play begins, Francis is employed because the bodyguard of gangster Roscoe Crabbe, who has mysteriously returned from the lifeless. In truth, Francis is working for the gangster’s twin sister, Rachel Crabbe (Christie Coran), who has disguised herself as Roscoe to extract a debt from Charlie “The Duck” Clench (Henri Lubatti).

Charlie’s dim-bulb daughter, Pauline (Cassandra Marie Murphy), was betrothed to Roscoe, a identified gay with a sadistic mood. It was to be a wedding of comfort — handy business-wise for each Roscoe and Charlie. However after Roscoe’s reported loss of life freed her from a daunting prospect, Pauline has turn out to be engaged to Alan Dangle (Paul David Story), a would-be actor whose each utterance of affection is as hammy as it’s sickly candy.

Rachel is making an attempt to acquire sufficient cash to get married herself. Her supposed, Stanley Stubbers (Ty Aldridge), an upper-class twit, murdered her thuggish brother, who was towards their union. If she will gather the dowry from Charlie, she and Stanley can sail to Australia to flee the police and stay fortunately ever after Down Underneath.

Missing the cash to purchase even a single portion of fish and chips at an area pub, Francis agrees to be Stanley’s right-hand man. Francis is decided to maintain his two bosses aside, a recipe for farcical mayhem, made all of the extra sophisticated by Rachel’s convincing drag act and Stanley’s ignorance of her grasp plan.

In true commedia type, character is future. The plot is prescribed by the constellation of sorts. Obstacles are arrange solely to be overcome in a stroke of mad luck or outlandish kindness. The longer the delay, the better the satisfaction when the whole lot is gaily resolved.

Christie Coran and Ty Aldridge in “One Man, Two Guvnors” at A Noise Inside.

(Craig Schwartz)

However the path to the blissful ending issues, and the actors make this journey a rollicking one. Aldridge’s Stanley is as obtuse as he’s supercilious, a harmful mixture for Francis and a hilarious one for us. Coran’s Rachel performs a intelligent robust man who places on a vicious façade to keep away from an precise battle. The efficiency — each in and throughout the play — works like a dream.

Murphy’s Pauline, a vacuous blonde too literal-minded for metaphor, and Story’s Alan, a scenery-chewer who hogs the highlight, are an ideal match. Charlie, the transactional patriarch, is as proudly corrupt as his underhanded lawyer, Harry Dangle (Lynn Robert Beg), who units an equally unhealthy instance for his child, Alan.

Dolly (Trisha Miller), Charlie’s bookkeeper who capably kinds out no matter crooked enterprise is put earlier than her, turns into the romantic object of Francis’ exploits within the second act, when meals turns into secondary to like — or its Majorca trip equal, the vacation he dangles earlier than her.

Towards the top of the primary act, a serving scene involving a multicourse meal and an octogenarian waiter named Alfie (Josey Montana McCoy) with an adjustable pacemaker brings Francis’ mania for meals to a feverish pitch. It’s an ingeniously choreographed slapstick routine, however the bit is even funnier after Francis conscripts a plant within the viewers to help him in hoarding meals.

A manufacturing of “One Man, Two Guvnors” at South Coast Repertory in 2015 did not summon the mandatory vivacity. That’s the place Rodriguez-Elliot and Elliot succeed, creating a celebration ambiance by means of not simply the hard-charging band (below the music path of Rod Bagheri) however the mod scenic design of Frederica Nascimento and the jaunty classic aptitude of Garry Lennon’s costumes.

Bean’s play is impressively labored out, mathematically and verbally. The wit is crisp and the comedian routines are evergreen, all of the extra so for the sharpness of the taking part in.

Mahaffy’s Francis is unfailingly vivid because the self-serving valet of commedia custom. However this manufacturing proves that “One Man, Two Guvnors” is greater than a star automobile for an insanely hungry clown.