Up Against Gale Farce Winds

British playwright Ray Cooney writes some of the funniest farces going today. His “Out of Order,” currently at the Newport Theatre Arts Center, is so comical and clever that it won the coveted British Olivier Award in 1991.

But farce is not easy. As director Ken Rugg acknowledges in his program notes, “Farce can present the director with a minefield of potential bombs.” And Rugg steps on a number of them.

He’s right on in his notes when he mentions the “breakneck pace” necessary to make farce work, but he forgets that the basic rule of pacing is to pick up cues as quickly as possible. Most of Rugg’s actors don’t.

Steve McCammon and Spider Madison manage to convey the controlled anxiety that underlies true farce. McCammon plays Richard Willey, around whom the chaos swirls. A Conservative British cabinet minister due for a late-night session of the House of Commons, Willey has taken a room at London’s Westminster Hotel for a dalliance with House secretary Jane Worthington.

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The spanners in Willey’s works are his wife, Pamela; Jane’s husband, Ronnie; and a Body, which must be hidden at all costs. Suffice it to say that all ends well in spite of the disasters that, right up to the end, befall Willey and his private secretary, George Pigden (a bumbling bachelor with an invalid mother whose nurse also turns up to complicate things).

As Jane and Pigden, Lisa Lampman and Kevin Knill come close to going overboard, but their shtick never becomes unreal. However, it’s shtick that ruins the chances of the rest of the cast.

Greg Hoffman’s mincing walk and mugging as a waiter, Geoffrey Draper’s sobbing as Ronnie, and the very overboard erotic abandon of Jacqueline Dumbrille as Willey’s wife and Judith Ryskiewicz as the nurse misfire completely. Farce is based on subtlety in the face of panic. Rugg should have stopped all this pointless carrying-on.

* “Out of Order,” Newport Theatre Arts Center, 2501 Cliff Drive, Newport Beach. Thursday-Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2:30 p.m. Ends Oct. 20. $13. (714) 631-0288. Running time: 2 hours.

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“Out of Order”

Steve McCammon: Richard Willey

Lisa Lampman: Jane Worthington

Kevin Knill: George Pigden

Spider Madison: a Body

Geoffrey Draper: Ronnie

Greg Hoffman: the Waiter

Jacqueline Dumbrille: Pamela

Judith Ryskiewicz: Gladys Foster

A Newport Theatre Arts Center production of a farce by Ray Cooney, produced by Dolly Ross and Rae Cohen, directed by Ken Rugg. Scenic design: John Nokes. Lighting design: Chad and Terri Brook, Bob Ashby. Stage manager: Barbara Ashby.