THEATER REVIEW : ‘Inspecting Carol’ Right on Target With Twists and Wit

There are very few plays that can put you in stitches and make you laugh till you cry. “Inspecting Carol,” a backstage Christmas farce at the Moulton Theater, does both.

Fresh, topical and outrageously funny, this Laguna Playhouse production will have you laughing out loud in the first act and wiping away the tears in the second.

The chief target of this savvy lampoon is not just those boilerplate stagings of “A Christmas Carol” that take over almost all our theaters at this time of year, but the whole fabric of pious customs entrenched in American theatrical culture.

Written by Daniel Sullivan and members of the nationally recognized Seattle Repertory Theatre (where Sullivan is artistic director), “Inspecting Carol” gives us a glimpse of a down-at-the-heels drama troupe that has lost half its subscribers and is trying to hang on to the rest with its 13th annual offering of the Dickens classic.

The plot depends on a nicely turned case of mistaken identity lifted in spirit from Gogol’s “The Government Inspector”: An amateur actor shows up out of the blue looking to audition for a role, any role, and wrongly is assumed to be a bureaucrat from the National Endowment for the Arts who has arrived incognito to evaluate the company.

Desperate to save the NEA grant, which is the only thing that stands between the company and financial collapse, the director tries to ingratiate herself by casting him in the play. Soon the rest of the troupe is fawning over him as well.

For all its comic exaggeration, Sullivan’s script has the ring of truth about the state of regional theater around the country. And this production, billed as a Southern California premiere, delivers the goods with a marvelous brand of burlesque that is hip but not sneering and absurd without being unreal.

*

Multiculturalism, political correctness and the NEA all come in for a gentle bashing. So do racial stereotyping, minority tokenism and the scads of abject grantees that depend on the NEA’s goodwill. Anyone who wants to celebrate the season with a satirical Yuletide show instead of a dutiful one ought to rush right over to the Moulton.

The bravura staging by Andrew Barnicle takes big risks going over the top and never misses. The well-cast ensemble responds with thoroughbred performances depicting a motley collection of recognizable types that are hugely entertaining.

Tom Shelton lays much of the groundwork with a sharp portrait of the company’s unctuous business manager. John Serembe, as the crackpot star of the troupe, adds a high comic sheen to the sendup with his take-charge Scrooge, who has a predilection for last-minute, socially relevant rewrites that drive the rest of the cast crazy.

Then there are Shannon McCleerey as the deadpan stage manager, Linda Bisesti as the self-dramatizing director and Andy Hedden as the mistaken NEA official who manages to transform every role he plays (including Tiny Tim) into the evil hunchback from Shakespeare’s “Richard III.”

Teri Ciranna offers a strong supporting performance as the troupe’s resident Brit who, in a bit of reverse English, affects a Brooklyn accent. Jim McElenney is a walking gag of rattling chains, and Kyle Jones, who looks truly dumbstruck playing a young actor on stage for the first time, gets some of the evening’s biggest laughs.

Technically, the show is a gem; play and production seem brilliantly matched. All the design elements are first-rate, from the detailed auditorium setting and purposely flimsy scenery to the cartoonish props, rich costumes and exemplary lighting. The set itself gets into the act in hilarious ways that will surprise you.

“Inspecting Carol” is hands down the funniest show I’ve seen all year.

* “Inspecting Carol,” Moulton Theater, 606 Laguna Canyon Road, Laguna Beach. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday matinees at 2. Ends Dec. 18. $17-$22. (714) 494-8021. Running time: 2 hours.