Theater Reviews : Tangled Web of ‘Liar’ Ensnares With Clowning

Ron Campbell, who is brilliant in the Laguna Playhouse production of Carlo Goldoni’s 1750 Venetian confection “The Liar (Il Bugiardo),” has been here before. This rarer-than-rare work by Goldoni, best known for “The Servant of Two Masters,” has never been here before, and the translation-adaptation (to a marginally Fellini-esque 1960) by Andrew and Sara Barnicle is absolutely fresh.

Still, as the inveterate fibber Lelio, Campbell must be having deja vu --especially on the splendid set by Giulio Cesare Perrone, which plunks us down in a richly rendered piazza in Venice: Campbell once drew crowds to Venetian piazzas with his own street performances.

The street performer is still in Campbell, who adds extra physical tricks to his performance--the kind of tricks only actors of the street know.

More crucially, he is our surest guide into a comedy with a Moliere-style plot (and moralities). When the tangle of shenanigans is unraveled, Goldoni makes sure that everyone understands: Lying always has consequences the liar never intended, so it’s best not to lie in the first place.

It’s not profound, and neither is the play. It’s the getting to the message that’s the fun, and it means going through a crazy looking glass of subterfuges.

Enter the swooning Florindo (Robert Knox), who orders his servant, Brighella (Brian McCoy), to send anonymous tokens of affection to Rosaura (Della Lisi).

Because Rosaura doesn’t know her suitor’s name, and because the cad Lelio also has his eye on Rosaura (and on her sister Beatrice, played by Beth Kellermann), and because he makes up lies as easily as he breathes, Lelio poses as the suitor.

When Lelio’s father, Pantalone (Gary Bell), returns to Venice with the sisters’ father, Dr. Balanzoni (John Ross Clark), Lelio is forced to even more baroque levels of lies, to the point that he is posing as a rival suitor.

It is all too much, even for his busy brain, and in the end he receives a fully deserved comeuppance.

Goldoni’s ingenuity is to makes us feel--like the men and women around Lelio--seduced by Lelio’s concoctions, then able to laugh at the traps Lelio sets for himself. Goldoni also lets us know that Lelio isn’t very proud of himself, which makes Lelio more than a mere device for a statement on ethics.

Campbell understands these dimensions; he can charm you right out of your wallet, then make you stand back and wonder at Lelio’s incredible nerve. This combined attraction-detachment is topped with at least a dozen pieces of unforgettable physical stage business (watch Campbell tie himself up in his own coat) that are undiluted clowning and even greater examples of an actor literally bringing a character inside out. It’s a remarkable feat.

Although his Pantalone arrives late on the scene, Bell constructs a magnificently full character whose eventual towering rage emerges from a father ashamed of his son’s two-facedness. It’s the kind of human comedy Goldoni intended as a response to commedia dell’arte cartoonishness.

Clark is funny as the other aggrieved parent, but as his daughters, Lisi and Kellermann are vocally weak in a company of declarative actors. Knox carefully avoids making his expressively love-struck Florindo a simp. As the servants of foolish masters, McCoy and Rob Addison’s Arlecchino offer fine contrasts--McCoy as a solid center of reason, Addison as a clown’s clown.

Patrick Munoz plays the put-upon voice of morality, Ottavio, a man of honor who loves letting us know what’s on his mind. Supporting foolishness arrives care of Alice Ensor as the Balanzonis’ maid and, most deliciously, with Andy Hedden as everyone from a delivery guy on a green Vespa to a money-grubbing postman.

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Hedden even arrives once by gondola, which gives an idea of the work that went into director Andrew Barnicle’s production. Like costumer Mary Saadatmanesh, whose work is classy and subdued, and light designer Paulie Jenkins, whose suggestions of reflecting canal water are very subtle, Barnicle doesn’t play up the excesses of Carnivale (when the action takes place) or of Fellini (which come mostly from the Nino Rota background music).

In fact, what this extremely listenable translation and ‘60s-era setting most recall is the lighter side of Pier Paolo Pasolini. But there is no obvious urge at the Moulton to do an homage, only the deeper urge to turn clowning into something that hurts.

* “The Liar,” the Moulton Theater, 606 Laguna Canyon Road, Laguna Beach. Tuesday-Friday, 8 p.m.; Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 and 7 p.m. Ends April 2. Tickets: $13-$22. (714) 497-9244. Ron Campbell: Lelio

Gary Bell: Pantalone

Rob Addison: Arlecchino

John Ross Clark: Dr. Balanzoni

Della Lisi: Rosaura

Beth Kellermann: Beatrice

Robert Knox: Florindo

Patrick Munoz: Ottavio

Alice Ensor: Colombina

Brian McCoy: Brighella

Andy Hedden: Cabbie/Delivery Man/Postman/Gondolier

A Laguna Playhouse production of a comedy by Carlo Goldoni, directed by Andrew Barnicle. Translation-adaptation: Andrew and Sara Barnicle. Set: Giulio Cesare Perrone. Lights: Paulie Jenkins. Costumes: Mary Saadatmanesh. Sound: David Edwards. Song by Steve Moshier.