More Spoof Than Spook in Santa Ana : Way Off Broadway’s silly production of ‘The Invisible Man’ is sometimes hilarious. Little attention paid to details that might build suspense.

The stage at Way Off Broadway has been decorated for the Halloween season as a creaky old Colorado lodge where strange doings are afoot. The troupe’s current production, “The Invisible Man,” is a campy spoof of the Abbott and Costello school, directed with exaggerated silliness by WOB’s artistic director, Tony Reverditto.

To a kitschy soundtrack that opens with Grieg’s “Hall of the Mountain King,” six girls arrive to spend Christmas week revitalizing the old resort as a home-ec class project. Someone is there before them, though--a suspicious caretaker with a changeable limp and a disappearing accent. Seems there’s gold hidden in that there lodge, and the company of treasure hunters includes a couple of flamboyant guests, an overzealous sheriff and a suave but invisible charmer.

To say that the characterizations are broad would be an understatement. Eyebrow acting is taken to new heights, and in a few cases, those heights are hilarious.

Eileen Farren as Karen, one of the home-ec students, sports an outlandishly geeky hairdo and the posture of a lamppost that’s been embraced by a speeding car. Her lisping words sound like bruised escapees from a jaw that appears to be hinged on backward.

Douglas Siskowic plays Deputy Sheriff Thompson with a lascivious grin and a deliciously unhinged gleam in his eye. He and Farren go whole hog into the silliness with funny results.

The rest of the company members have varying success fulfilling the cartoon-like strokes of Reverditto’s comic style. Laura Williams’ Nancy Drew looks are perfect for the heroine, and Liz Estes, with her Lina Lamont voice and wide wiggle, is almost there as the dizzy Gertrude. JoLynn Jones’ oft-heard laugh is full-bodied.

The script, by Eddie Cope, is a compendium of stock gags that Reverditto and his actors milk for every conceivable chuckle. There’s not much attention paid to details that might build suspense. Williams lounges about in a sleeveless top during a Christmas week blizzard. However, the few moments that a snow effect have in the spotlight bring the biggest laughs of the night.

‘The Invisible Man’

A Way Off Broadway production of the play by Eddie Cope, directed by Tony Reverditto, with Michael Silverback, Laura Williams, Liz Estes, Eileen Farren, Melinda Riemer, Kelly Godfrey, January Gordon, Will Ferrell, Joe Kawaja, JoLynn Jones and Douglas Siskowic. Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m. through Nov. 16, and Sunday Oct. 27 at 2 p.m., at 1058 E. 1st St., Santa Ana. Tickets: $12.50 and $10 (for children under 15). Group rates available. (714) 547-8997.