Cheryl Willis as Margot Wendice. Photo: Michal Daniel

Welcome back to the days of civilized murder and mayhem, done with style by people who wear dinner jackets and sip brandy in an elegant gold-toned living room. This is the world recreated at the Jungle Theater for Frederick Knott’s 1952 Broadway hit, Dial M for Murder, a classy production and wonderfully satisfying evening of theater.

Tennis star, Tony Wendice (Michael Booth) married his wife Margot (Cheryl Willis) strictly for her money. He arranges to have her murdered (for the same reason), but his perfectly planned crime and alibi goes awry. There’s no mystery, in this case, about the murder itself; the question is whether or not the murderer will get caught. In an age when action at a blinding pace is the rule, and gratuitous violence is all but required to satisfy in a film, it is all the more arresting that a play with characters conversing in polite airs can make the heart beat a little faster with creeping dread.

Director Bain Boehlke has the class to not mess with this virtually flawless script for the genre. Yes, there were a few soft chuckles from the audience over period dialogue, but there’s nothing dated about a well-crafted piece, produced with finesse and polish. Boehlke just refused to hurry things along, even into the third act (Yes, there are three acts) where the restrained tempo of it was everything.

Casting was beautifully balanced: Cheryl Willis as Margot might have let on too much, or “played the victim,” but there was none of that. In spite of the sinister truth we knew and she didn’t, her in-the-moment performance always returned us to her innocent reality, helplessly watching her fall into her husband’s trap.

Terry Hempleman was just awkward enough as Max, Margot’s illicit love interest, to be believably strung along for the duration of the play before he finally figures it out – even given his profession as a mystery writer. There’s a touch of the comic in Hempleman’s performance as the genuine nice guy—just the right foil for Michael Booth’s casual  detachment as Margot’s husband, Tony, The difference between a murder in a script and a real murder is that the real murder rarely goes according to plan, Max tells him. Even Tony, a master manipulator, proves this theory—just one of the tasty scenes coated with irony. As handsome and charming a villain as you’ll see on a stage, Tony is so clever and attractive that you may find yourself admiring him.

What British murder mystery would be complete without a visit from Scotland Yard’s chief inspector? If ever there was a preconceived idea about this iconic character, it would have to be Gary Briggle as Inspector Hubbard. Making an appearance later in the story, Hubbard methodically dismantles the collection of details-turned-clues assembled over the first half of the play, without giving up the game until the final coup.

Aha. Now, for a glass of wine in the lobby and the fun of kicking around just who knew what, and when. The show, which opens the Jungle Theaters 22^nd season, runs through March 18.

Emily Swallow as Maggie in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof."

Tennessee Williams play, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, may be finally showing its age, but it is still timeless enough to pack a wallop. The Guthrie’s production, directed by Lisa Peterson, has placed this piece among tall, peacock blue louvered doors and a matching carpet of swirls that seem to heighten the swirl of personal anxieties. A hot orange glow spreads across the back scrim, directing the eye to the mustard-colored bed that tells us, before the first word is spoken, what this play is really about. I didn’t really like the look of this set, which is why it fits the unsettling story of Big Daddy, Big Mama, Brick and Maggie.

It is part of the genius of Williams that characters so flawed, who try very little to be truly conciliatory, can still be so engaging – and funny. By the time we see for ourselves what Big Daddy, played brilliantly by David Anthony Brinkley, is allabout,  we are deftly primed to share his satisfaction in shutting everybody up, and stripping Brick’s aloofness bare. Peter Christian Hansen as Brick, had a slow start in defining the widening rift between his wife, Maggie (Emily Swallow) and him, grappling with Brick’s silence as much as the genteel Southern accent. But once cornered by Big Daddy, Brick’s pain is brought too close to the surface. Hansen and Brinkley’s scenes in the second half of the play are heart-wrenchingly real.

Swallow’s Maggie was as solitary as a cat, circling Brick now and then, seeking out a stroke of affection, then returning to the world of the big house they share with the rest of the family – until Maggie finds her way in, through the door opened by Big Daddy. By that time, though, it feels more like Maggie getting her way than a true reconciliation and healing of their relationship. Swallow carries the role with great strength and style, but little was simmering between the two.

Melissa Hart as Big Mama was simply wonderful – stridently irritating voice and all, her devotion to Big Daddy and Brick carrying the story along in comforting waves. Chris Carlson as the unfavored son, Gooper, and Michelle O’Neill as his wife, Mae, nicely captured their desperate and hopeless efforts to please Big Daddy by maintaining a steady work life and supplying him with several grandchildren. The grandchildren made intermittent appearances, carefully choreographed disruptions that sort of came out of nowhere and just as quickly stopped. There was very little about this behavior that seemed believable.

Peterson’s direction seemed to be more a collection of concepts, rather than a clear vision of the overall effect. Her use of Brick’s crutch, for example, was overdone, as was Maggie literally chasing him around the bedroom.

Over fifty years have passed since this play premiered and a lot has changed; sexual identity questions are at least discussed openly, and doctors today would not dream of lying to a patient about his diagnosis. Assuming one can view the crises in this light, the universal truths about love, friendship, family bonds, sexuality, even life and death itself –  the larger questions that made this play great – have not lost their relevance. If you have even the slightest interest in Williams, this period and this style of theater, you really should make an effort to see this production. It runs through February 26.

John Mitchell (E.J. Subkoviak) and Richard Nixon (Paul de Cordova) strategize about how to make Nixon the Republican nominee for president. Photo: Scott Pakudaitis.

Produced by the History Theatre at the Minnesota History Center, in tandem with the exhibit that opened last fall, 1968 is also a collaborative project with the Playwrights Center. Seven scenes written by PWC members tell personal stories that are representative of significant events during that year.

The scenes were ingeniously connected by a timeline created by History Theatre artistic director, Ron Peluso, who also directed. Music snippets from familiar TV shows, primarily, arranged and directed by Gary Rue and delivered by a talented band of McNally-Smith students, cemented the segues.

The scenes:
Welcome Home by Reginald Edmund offered a highly personal look at one Viet Nam war veteran dealing with his combat experience after he came home. Eric Knutson as Jerry showed great sensitivity and range in his portrayal of the troubled soldier. The ending, however, needed some foreshadowing to better bring us along with him.

Go Up Together, written by Christina Ham, portrays the relationship of two friends struggling with the question of taking sides in the Memphis, Tennessee, sanitation workers strike. But the play, as well as the incident dramatized, has far more to do with the larger question of a Black man’s identity and place in society.

The experience of Rosemary Clooney depicted in Rosemary by Kevin Kautzman, seemed an odd choice, although it showed us the impact Bobby Kennedy’s death had on others, including those we might not have connected with the presidential contender. Karen Weber convincingly depicted Clooney’s mental collapse; however, you needed to know the back story, since it wasn’t clearly scripted, to fully appreciate its meaning.

John Mitchell’s Private Moment by Dominic Orlando is a wonderful piece of well-crafted satire. Paul de Cordova as Richard Nixon and E.J. Subkoviak as John Mitchell (plus compressed cameos of Henry Kissinger and others) take us inside the heads of these two controversial figures in a darkly comic imagining of the events and attitudes that ultimately led to their famous demise. Cordova picks on just a couple of Nixon’s verbal and visual ticks to fashion his impersonation, and it works beautifully. Subkoviak delivered an immensely satisfying and entertaining tour de force. He simply owned the evening.

Smith & Carlos by Kim Hines made room for what anyone who remembers 1968 may have been thinking: what do these young people know about it? That the show could ultimately laugh at itself a little, too, was refreshing.

The Corral by Rhianna Yazzie was inspired by the founding of the American Indian Movement (AIM) in Minnesota, but dramatized via the brutal treatment by police of two Indian men leaving the Corral on Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis. This device, however, didn’t give those unfamiliar with AIM much to go on, but M. Cochise Anderson, in particular, as Moon evoked the conditions that gave birth to AIM and the passions driving the movement. Rob Thomas offered an interesting counterpoint as his companion.

Apollo 8 by Mat Smart, the final scene, was an anachronistic look at that day through one astronaut’s experience – but not one who was actually on the flight. As deftly as Randy Schmeling delivered on the engaging script as the main character, the story line didn’t quite anchor the weight of that historic event.

Peluso’s work as the cohesive element was critical to the success and entertainment value of this show. He not only deftly incorporated a style of theater completely in keeping with the period, (with the ensemble in multiple arrangements on metal scaffolding) but he bridged the gaps and provided necessary light-hearted relief from the heavy drama of some of the scenes. His timeline really polished off the rough edges and pulled the idea into one whole.

1968  runs through February 19.  Note that the performances are at the History Center of Minnesota on Kellogg, not the History Theatre in the McNally-Smith building.

Recommended. Baby Boomers,  bring your children and older grandchildren and you could set up a great conversation with them about your own experiences in this era.

Jessica Fredrickson as Cinderella and Tonia Hughes as the Fairy Godmother. Photo by Ryan Jones

The Ordway Center for the Performing Arts is offering up a magical evening for families this holiday season with Rogers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella. No, it’s not about Christmas, but it’s a gentle and satisfying story full of sparkle and spectacle that’s sure to create a warm memory, particularly for the little girl in your life.

In this version, Cinderella (Jessica Fredrickson) is treated badly by her stepmother (Gretta Grosch) and stepsisters, Grace (Colleen Somerville), and Joy (Andrea Wollenberg), but mostly they’re just silly. They bicker, wear outrageously tacky costumes, they sing, they dance, they fall off the furniture and down the stairs. Oh, yes, they are funny. The laughter of children was evidence enough.

Even the youngest in the audience understood that all Cinderella had to do was listen to her Fairy Godmother, played with humor and style by Tonia Hughes, and believe in herself to find her way out of her predicament. Fredrickson is delightfully natural in the role, with a powerhouse voice that seems to just float out of her. We are equally charmed by her prince (Jeremiah James), whose Sweetest Sounds is sweet indeed, with just the right mix of naiveté and determination.

The King and Queen (Gary Briggle and Wendy Lehr) delight as the loving parents in Boys and Girls Like You and Me. They are the parents every child would love to have.

As talented as the name roles and the entire ensemble is, it’s tempting to give the technicians in this show top billing. In addition to the large, multiple sets gliding and flying in and out and the beautiful use of black scrim, Technical Director Jason Allyn-Schwerin pulled off some dazzling stunts with black lights and sparkle effects – some of them nicely set up by the mice, dove and cat puppetry.

You don’t have to accompany a very young lady to enjoy this show, but if you happen to know one, I suggest you dress her up in the frothy ball gown she loves to wear, put a wand in her hand, and whisk her off to downtown St. Paul. Bundle her up, too, so you can stroll under the millions of lights in Rice Park. It’s a nice segue from the fairy tale to the parking lot.

Cinderella runs through January 1.

Bass (Chris Bates), Trumpet (Adam Meckler), Woodwinds (Dale Mendenhall), Drums (Jay Epstein), and Violin (Gary Schulte). Photography by Petronella Ytsma.

For the holiday season, Park Square Theatre has chosen to revive the warmly received show about George Gershwin that premiered there in 1999. The Soul of Gershwin: The Musical Journey of an American Klezmer is a delightful musical offering: a well-researched and interesting story backed by wonderful music – with not one single holiday tune.

Gershwin’s instantly recognizable, note-bending ascending clarinet riff sets the stage for a show that’s all about that clarinet – and a violin, drums, bass and trumpet, too. Like a really cool music prof, Michael Paul Levin as George Gershwin narrates his own story – a staged music history lesson – supported by three singers who serve to illustrate his points. But really it’s about the band, and they are simply amazing.

Dale Mendenhall on that wailing clarinet, Chris Bateson bass, Jay Epstein on drums, Adam Meckler on trumpet, and Gary Schulte on violin, with the show’s creator, band leader, and pianist Joseph Vass, make up the band “Klezmerica,” stirring up an exuberant mix of traditional Jewish and early 20^th century tunes, and Gershwin’s own music, from Tin Pan Alley to the ground-breaking Porgy and Bess.

Each instrumentalist is a virtuoso in his own right, but besides playing just a blizzard of notes at a ­­­­­­­­­­­cracking pace, they also played the right thing at the right time, including sweet melodies exquisitely phrased. Schulte’s violin solo work on Bulka’s Song, for example, which opened Act II, was absolutely lovely. I was especially taken with Epstein’s performance on drums because he really is a performer, and his style of drumming is so peculiar, it seems to me, to klezmer.

We have long thought of Gershwin as the guy who put his own stamp on a particular kind of popular, jazz-influenced music – and he did. But this show is out to clarify the relationships and make the point that Gershwin was, above all else, influenced by his own Jewish music and culture and, at its heart, even Summertime from Porgy and Bess owes more to cantorial singing than jazz or gospel. He may be holding hands with jazz or gospel (or ragtime or blues), but at its heart, he wrote his own style of Jewish music.

Three singers – Maggie Burton as The Chazzen or Cantor, Prudence Johnson as The Chanteuse, and T. Michael Rambo as The Griot or Storyteller – make Vass’s premise not just easily digestible, but deliciously so, demonstrating how Gershwin admittedly stole from anywhere and anyone, making famous someone else’s musical phrases in enduring songs such as S’Wonderful and It Ain’t Necessarily So.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard Rambo sing so sweetly as he did in The Sidewalks of New York and Embraceable You, and he was warm and completely engaged with his audience every minute. This isn’t easy with no dialogue, or even ad libs, in fact, with no dramatic action for them at all.

Burton simply took charge of A Mixed Blessing in a cantorial riff-off with Rambo’s gospel version – an even contest and great fun. I admit to limited knowledge when it comes to cantors, but with her powerhouse voice and delivery, she has to be right up there with the best of them.

Johnson brought us back to more familiar territory with The Man I Love, but didn’t really get rolling until closer to the end of the evening with It Ain’t Necessarily So and the I Got Rhythm Reprise. Where, I have to wonder, was that spark in Act I?

Aside from some weird settings on the vocal mics (and they were too hot for my taste), it was technically clean, with a moody backdrop and cabaret-style lighting that supported the show’s relaxed ambiance.

A very pleasant evening, it brightened up a gray day with music we still love generations after it was first imagined by Gershwin and his contemporaries.

The show runs through January 1.

The cast of "Bob's Holiday Office Party"

There is at least one theater in Minnesota that is not trying to be “relevant,” or “important.” They just want to get people in the door and show them a good time. In fact, that is exactly their mission and it appears to be working. A full house guffawed their way through “Bob’s Holiday Office Party” for the opening at Camp Bar and Cabaret.  Produced by Actors Theater of Minnesota and directed by John Haynes, this show is just one of the lighthearted entertainments currently running for the company.

In the small town of Neuterberg — presumably in Iowa — Bob, the local insurance agent, has invited his friends (who are also his clients) to his annual Christmas party – potluck, of course, with a cooler full of beer and a shelf of cheap booze. They are: the swishy mayor Roy Mincer (David Beukema), who’s been sober for six whole days, and his bizarrely glamorous wife, Marjorie (Meisha Johnson) who’s in a well-known affair with Bob; twin sisters LaDonna and LaVoris Johnson (Heidi Fellner and Debra Berger), who are rich farmers, arrive on a combine and make animal noises; Sheriff Joe (Tim Dybevik) who’s as ridiculously redneck as any Southern stereotype and fiercely protective of his town; Brandy, the town floosy and Carol the pastor’s hysterical wife (both played by Deanne McDonald); the happy stoner (Kevin McLaughlin); and the title role, played by Charles Fraser.

The nasty, nerdy kid who nobody liked, Elwin Bewee (Pat O’Brien), has turned into a successful entrepreneur and comes back to basically buy up the town, starting with Bob’s office building, and get back at everybody who made his growing up years miserable. Bob is tempted by the offer, since he fancies himself an inventor and wants to go to school in Des Moines. The town, however, clearly depends on him, since he appears to be the only reasonably sane person in it. And that’s all the plot this inflated sketch comedy needs.

What really makes this work is clever writing that never lingers on a silly joke too long – that and broadly drawn characters (which seems like a profound understatement). At its heart this is improv-based and stands or falls on the strength of each actor’s ability to launch a character solid enough to hold his or her own in the melee.

It’s silly, sloppy, a little raunchy and so far over-the-top that you would actually have to try not to laugh. But regardless of how you feel about this style of theater, one thing is unmistakable: it takes a skilled ensemble to rise above unbearably corny and pull it off – and they do. Think of your favorite Saturday Night Live characters. Some work better than others, but once you lift a show to this frenetic plane, everyone pretty much has to function there. (However, I think it would have been a clever turn for McLaughlin to play Marty as more like Carlin’s laid-back hippie-dippie weatherman and less just plain stupid, albeit endearing.)

The show is a natural fit for local audiences in one way for sure. It was written by natives of the Midwest, Joe Keyes and Rob Elk, who continue to update the show with timely politically incorrect material. Their production in Los Angeles, where the show originated several years ago, has had a long-running following. Special material was contributed by Mark Fite for this production.

If you’re looking for some laughs in a crowded and jovial cabaret setting, this is it. It’s plain, unadulterated fun. The show runs through December 31.

No theater I’ve seen in the Twin Cities moves me more than this company. All the years of study, the carefully honed skills, the influences of this theory of acting or that teacher/director – they’re all stripped away and what is left is a pure and honest expression of what that artist has to say. I laughed, I cried, I laughed so hard I cried. It was less than perfect and it was absolutely wonderful.

Developed with the cast and edited by Kevin Kling, Eriq Nelson and Vanessa I. Davis, director Tod Petersen guides a large cast of performers through a cleverly timed mix of original songs, skits, standup comedy and dance, all super-charged by Kling’s brilliantly daffy comic scripting. Additional professionals (Scotty Reynolds and Colette Illarde as choreographer among them) provided support on stage – amazingly unobtrusively given the myriad special needs of the performers.

“Aren’t I Wonderful” was wonderfully silly; a serious subject is at the essence of good comedy, illustrated by “The I Can’t Remember Blues;” and “Why Worry?” was as clever as any musical comedy rhythm song I’ve heard. In “Invisible” one performer speaking in the first person recites “If you touch me, I become real … hiding among the real people …” as another performer moves silently across the stage. It was a lesson in line reading and sharing a scene.

“The Rise of the Rest” was a rousing gospel-style solo with chorus, and there were some rockin’ chops coming from the piano on “Low Downs Loser” (which is not a typo).  I was transfixed by “Pretty Good,” which begins with the performer’s list of things she does “not so good,” and ends with finding joy in what she can do “pretty good.” If only all acting were this genuine! There’s even a little Shakespeare, recited by a performer who clearly loves the bard.

Live acts were interspersed with video clips of the performers talking about what “joy” meant to them. The answers, which were surprising, touching and very funny, showed solid editing by the production team.

If you want to be affected by your theater experience and entertained this is the show for you. “Joy”  runs through Dec. 17. Recommended.

The combination is just plain great fun. Robinson and Will are capable of making the verging-on-pointless (arguing over paint in Menards) to the fundamentally serious (dealing with ADD) equally funny, and while there is a sketch/song about a ménage a trios, and a few other slightly risqué references, this writing duo doesn’t sucker for the cheap sex joke laughs – and that earns them extra stars in my book.

The excitement with sketch comedy – and especially with live improv – is the inherent danger in it. I don’t know if they thought of this when picking the title. (There aren’t any “Lost in Space” references, so I assume it was just fun with names.) Sometimes the sketch works, sometimes it sort of works, but not quite. The entertainment value is in its immediacy – watching the actors find their way to the laugh line at lightning speed, and when they do, there is no more satisfying moment in theater, and last night’s audience loved it.

Incorporating a mix of improv and scripted scenes works beautifully in this show. Highlights among the scripted scenes include Cassioppi as a mother telling her daughter the story of how she almost swore once; Will as a son forced into the trauma of admitting to his parents that he’s left handed (“There just aren’t that many people left to make fun of, except maybe Canadians and where’s the fun in that?”); and Eriq Nelson’s Bible geneology (“Jeremiah was a bullfrog …”), which was just plain brilliant.

The setting was less than ideal. The theater in the Hudson Inn in Hudson, Wisc., has a sweet little stage and café seating, but the mediocre bar food and strange lighting stripped some of the ambience. However, the cast had ready access to the audience who willingly shared suggestions for the improv bits.

All in all, it’s smart writing and relevant satire offered up by skilled performers who aren’t afraid to take risks and lay their egos at our feet. That takes guts and I love it.

Next I’d like to see recognizable characters, which is at the heart of sketch comedy. When TV sketch comedy was primetime, characters created by Carol Burnett, Cher, Red Skelton, and many others – even Johnny Carson – turned these successful performers into huge stars. If Will and Robinson, in particular had established, identifiable characters that appeared in all their shows, they’d bump up the excitement and turn their fans into fanatics. They certainly have the chops to do it.

You’ve missed your opportunity for this one, but Table Salt Productions holiday show, “Spiked! Put a Little Punch in Your Holidays” opens December 1 with Will, Robinson and Curley once more at the helm. It could be another “dangerous” show.

Elise Langer, Kimberly Richardson, Sarah Agnew and Karen Wiese-Thompson in Il Campiello. Photo: Paula Keller.

Ten Thousand Things Theater continues its practice of bringing theater to people who may otherwise never see it with a new adaptation of Carlo Goldoni’s Il Campiello. Steven Epp’s adaptation is commedia-inspired fun—a little Laurel & Hardy, a little light satire, and lots of lazzi (“schtick” identified often with a certain character and repeated for comic effect).

TTT’s artistic director and the director of the production, Michelle Hensley, announced before Friday’s opening at Open Book, that even the boys at one of the correctional facilities where they performed couldn’t help but laugh — and neither could we.

Written for the Venetian Carnival of 1756 to “enliven the scene,” Goldoni reported, in this production there are only mentions of the event. These are the working poor and Carnival is little more than an excuse to gamble more than usual. The campiello—the village square—brings them together largely because there’s nowhere for them to go. There they are, looking across the square at each other, and there we are, looking across the in-the-round stage at each other. It’s a perfect fit for this play.

The action is largely squabbling over trifles with each other, trifles over which they have been squabbling forever. Beyond that, the two widows, Pasqua (Sarah Agnew) and Catte (Karen Wiese-Thompson) want to marry off their daughters, but they’re just as interested in finding husbands of their own. Not likely. Then a stranger wanders into their little square; Cavalier (Randy Reyes), a nobleman from Naples, has only enough money to last through Carnival. This is enough to qualify as an inciting incident.

At their core, the people who inhabit the campiello have good hearts and care, in their off-hand way, about each other and their little corner of the world. Cavalier seems to realize this from the outset and is immediately taken with it. “Sweet as sunshine one minute and a rock thrown at your head the next,” he says. But more, he’s taken with Gasparina (Christiana Clark). She is statuesque and curvy; he is short and slight, a dandy setup for wonderful bits of nonsense.

The widows’ daughters, Lucietta (Elise Langer), and Agnese (Kimberly Richardson) have their sights set on Zorzetto (Brian Curtis James) and Anzoletto (Nathan Keepers), respectively. The girls are not allowed to leave their houses, generally, so there’s a good bit of business set up by hormones conflicting with their upbringing. Richardson’s Agnese is frightened of everything. (“I threw up in my mouth,” she tosses off.) And Langer’s Lucietta of nothing—a feisty match for the tough-guy posturing of her beau.

Keepers called up a baffling assortment of physical tricks for the young Anzoletto, then intermittently reappearing as the old uncle, Fabrizio. Agnew as an old crone was hilarious breezing through her props-hidden-in-the-skirt lazzi. Even if you’re not a fan of physical comedy (and I am), Agnew and Keepers, in particular, are so good that I guarantee you will be laughing.

Epp’s script, written in his distinctive voice, has the sound of children at spontaneous play. While it’s engaging in the moment, it’s also a bit like following the “plot” acted out by kids playing in the backyard: quick interactions strung together on a simple premise, such as “let’s play house,” or “let’s play wedding.”

There’s a reason Commedia dell’Arte theater worked so well: everybody already knew the characters, their relationships and their motivations. In this play, it’s less clear—fun moment-to-moment, but the larger picture is fuzzy. Once you figure it out, however, you realize that there’s not enough of a plot to fret about anyway. This is about character—a happy joke about our nonsensical quibbles and shallow motivations.  Music director Peter Vitale underscores this with live, acoustic sound effects and lively tunes on the accordion.

Of course there is a wedding—two, in fact—and a good bit of drinking to celebrate. That just makes for more rowdy, noisy fun. So, in the language of the play, “Don’t be a poop-turd.” Join in!

Il Campiello runs through November 20 at Open Book, but you may be able to share the experience in a prison, housing project or homeless shelter. Check www.tenthousandthings.org for information.

Fagin (Steve Hendrickson) and Oliver Twist (Noah Coon)

St. Paul’s Park Square Theatre has included a Victorian era piece in recent seasons and continues this season with an adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist by Neil Barlett. Joel Sass, the Jungle Theater’s associate artistic director was coaxed across the river to design and direct this one. It was a good call for Park Square.

Sass was free to implement a cohesive vision for the production top to bottom that worked well in the space and with this adaptation – and it was rather nice to see a period piece set in the proper period.

The small, unit set crowded with functioning props supported the sense of the characters’ wretched lives – literally and figuratively lived underground, but for their forays into the streets to pillage the unsuspecting moneyed classes. Set painting to makeup, visual elements were just extreme enough to lend a grotesque cartoon quality to it, turning violence and cruelty into fairy tale-like violence and cruelty.

The convention of presentational scenes alternating with direct address to the audience (in character) reinforced the fact that Dickens’ book is primarily sentimental, teaches a moral lesson and must end well for our young hero.

And it all works. Stephen Cartmell is as artful a Dodger as you’ll ever see, Noah Coon as Oliver is convincingly adorable, and Steve Hendrickson plays the slippery Fagin with crusty composure. There are many other fine individual performances, but the success of this production is more in its ensemble work, with several actors playing multiple roles; setting up new scenes with the a board, a bench, a chair; and supplying the live, acoustic sound effects via instruments and traps dangling from the ceiling or whisked through the over-large doorways positioned left, right, and upstage. These devices provided constant visual interest, distraction at the proper moments, a seamless flow from scene to scene (there are 24) and the pure fun of watching 13 polished performers pull off dozens of characters and locales using good old creative dramatics techniques and not much else. And they all sing.

This is lively entertainment, done with spirit and finesse, and appropriate for most ages. (Yes, there is a hanging, but in keeping with the style of the production, the riggings are obvious.) Oliver Twist runs through November 6. Recommended!