STAGE REVIEWS : A Rocky ‘Blue Harbor Honeymoon’

Disastrous moments can upset an entire production. Take the moment Tallulah Bankhead passes gas in “Blue Harbor Honeymoon” at the Chapel Court Theatre. Mercifully, we’re spared the sound effects, but the other characters, including Noel Coward, light up matches and wave their hankies.

Now Bankhead was a wild gal, but this lowbrow, British music hall vulgarity in a comedy that’s supposed to be sophisticated is remarkably gross. The actress (Charner Wallis) does not survive it. The play by Ron Lazar, directed by Richard Merson, doesn’t survive either, but the reasons go beyond flatulence.

First the good news. The young lovers who are patterned after Noel Coward characters (the auburn Robin Langsford and the saucer-eyed Shano Palovich) are buoyant and expressive. And the crisp Charles Tachovsky (who descends from the flies--i.e., heaven--on a gilded throne) is exquisitely Noel Coward in his clipped and polished manner. But the barrage of Coward lines, the relentless bickering, the smart verbiage for the sake of verbiage, the circular rather than progressive momentum, is mind-boggling.

This is poor man’s Coward, full of bombast and even a sex-change operation (typical of the mind-set here). The result is soporific, with a veneer of British humor.