THEATER : Have a ‘Grande de Coca-Cola’ and a Smile

Lara Teeter didn’t have to stray far to find inspiration while directing “El Grande de Coca-Cola” at Cal State Fullerton. He’d just turn on the TV, switch to a Spanish-speaking station and wait for a Mexican variety show to appear.

He was always bemused by the excitable emcees, the mostly inexplicable comedy skits and the Las Vegas-by-way-of-Mexico-City dance numbers. What makes entertainment sense to many Latinos left Teeter gaping and giggling.

“This isn’t meant to be a put-down, but these programs are very strange, almost like they are living perpetually in amateur hour,” said Teeter, a former Broadway performer who now teaches in CSUF’s theater and drama department.

“They do these odd little skits, and the audience goes wild,” Teeter said. “There’s (much of that) in our show too.”

He explained that “El Grande de Coca-Cola,” which opens at CSUF’s Arena Theatre on Friday night for a two-weekend run, is a musical spoof about staging a revue in a rundown Latin American town. Picture a grown-up set of Little Rascals with Spanish accents determined to put on a show, no matter how meager their talents.

The skimpy plot of “El Grande de Coca-Cola,” written by Ron House, John Neville-Andrews, Alan Shearman, Diz White and Sally Willis, centers on Senor Don Pepe Hernandez, the impresario of a truly lousy vaudeville troupe that, for the most part, stars his relatives.

After convincing the local press of Trujillo that he’s imported a galaxy of famous cabaret performers, Hernandez persuades his uncle, the manager of the town’s Coca-Cola bottling plant, to give him enough money to rent a nightclub. Art, or what passes for it in Trujillo, doesn’t always agree with commerce, though, and Hernandez’s company (called the “Low Moan Spectacular” for unexplained reasons) has to litter its revue with several ads for the soft drink.

“That’s where a lot of the fun, the wildness, comes in,” said Teeter, who co-directed the production with Don Finn, a CSUF theater and drama professor. “About one-quarter of the show is spent glorifying Coke, and we push it right over the top . . . the show (satirizes commercialism), and we do too.”

Teeter gave a couple of examples. In one, “a Chubby Checker type” and a troupe of dancing girls twist mightily while he sings about the joy of Coke. Another, more risque number features the production’s “token stripper” gyrating and writhing on the floor while a “regular-sized bottle of the stuff” dangles above her.

Teeter noted that he, Finn and the cast dreamed up both skits. Although “El Grande de Coca-Cola” has a basic plot and many set-pieces, the musical allows for improvisation by any theater group that tackles it, he said.

Other bits include a graceless routine on roller-skates, crummy magic tricks and bad celebrity impersonations. There’s also a sneering salute to “Wheel of Fortune,” featuring letter-turner Vanna Blanco and a game board-sized wheel that “all the contestants have to bend over to see,” Teeter said.

“Just silly stuff,” Teeter said. “You have to understand that that’s what this is all about.”

* What: “El Grande de Coca-Cola.”

* When: Friday, March 10, and Saturday, March 11, at 8 p.m., and Sunday, March 12, at 5 p.m. Also, March 16 through 18 at 8 p.m., March 18 at 2:30 p.m., and March 19 at 5 p.m.

* Where: Cal State Fullerton’s Arena Theatre, 800 N. State College Blvd., Fullerton.

* Whereabouts: Take the Riverside (91) Freeway to State College Boulevard and head north.

* Wherewithal: $4 and $6.

* Where to call: (714) 773-3371.