THEATER REVIEW: ‘COMEDY OF ERRORS’ : Identity Crisis : A touring company’s outdoor performance of Shakespeare’s knockabout play is great fun.

Generally regarded as Shakespeare’s earliest play, “The Comedy of Errors” is certainly one of his funniest.

A locally produced version is touring the southern Ventura County area for the next several weekends, with performances in a variety of outdoor locations. It’s free, a knockabout comedy that’s great fun, and about as painless an introduction to Shakespeare as exists.

Borrowing a plot from the Roman playwright Plautus, involving long-separated twin brothers, Shakespeare doubled the confusion by adding a second set of identical twins. Predictably, high jinks aplenty ensue, most of them resulting from the fact that neither pair of siblings is aware that all four are in the same town and interacting with the same set of perplexed locals.

The plot’s so thin that everybody except the characters onstage can see through it, and so full of holes that it’s a wonder that none of the players stumble into one and disappear from view altogether.

In order for the machinations to work properly, Shakespeare gave both sets of twins identical first names: the heroes are both Antipholus, and their comic foil servants, both Dromio.

In this production, directed by Michael Jordan, one actor plays each set of twins: David Westbay is Dromio and his brother, Dromio, and a fellow who calls himself “Bird” plays both Antipholuses.

Both actors handle the low comedy well, with Bird especially adept at creating distinct personalities in each of the “identical” brothers he portrays--Antipholus of Ephesus is rather pompous, and could be played by John Cleese. Antipholus of Syracuse is more of an adventurer, and handles the confusion with much greater grace.

Jordan rewrote the last scene so that both sets of twins wouldn’t have to be onstage at the same time.

In the current production, reviewed at the Arts Council Center in Thousand Oaks last Saturday, Mary Ruberry is convincingly shrewish and (understandably) jealous as the wife of Antipholus of Ephesus, with Toni Frisk-Beery charming and (like most of the characters) bewildered as her younger and unmarried sister, Luciana. And you don’t have to have seen much Shakespeare to figure out whom Luciana winds up with at the end of the show.

The “Classics in the Park” series was discontinued several years ago. Ironically, the final production was a version of this same play, also directed by Jordan. If the current version of “The Comedy of Errors” is any indication of what this new troupe is capable of, here’s to several more winning seasons.

* WHERE AND WHEN: “The Comedy of Errors” is the first of a new series of “Classics in the Park,” produced by the Conejo Recreation & Park District, the Performing Artists Guild, the Arts Council of Conejo Valley and Gothic Productions. The show can be seen this Saturday at 7 p.m. at Borchard Park in Newbury Park, and Sunday at 5 p.m. at Mae Boyar Park near Agoura Hills. Subsequent performances will be held on Saturdays and Sundays through Aug. 4 in outdoor locations in Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley, Agoura and Port Hueneme. Call (805) 499-4355 for additional information and reservations.