Fastballs Could Use a Change-Up in ‘Noises Off’ at Curtis Theatre

Theater loves to cannibalize itself. One of the more zany devourings is Michael Frayn’s “Noises Off.”

The 1982 comedy follows a small company as it stumbles madly through something called “Nothing On,” a play with a plot too convoluted to explain. All we need to know is that Frayn is making a satiric farce about staging a farce.

At the Curtis Theatre in Brea, the Vanguard Theatre Ensemble has mounted a passable version. Director Wade Williamson has everything in place--from the startled, desperate actors to a revolving stage that fulfills the show’s demanding technical needs--and laughs do come.

But why, then, are stretches so flat, even numbing? It’s all about tempo. Farce, perhaps theater’s toughest challenge, needs deliveries of different speeds every now and then to give us pause and let the momentum begin again. Williamson and his energetic cast throw almost nothing but fastballs.

There’s a lot of running around and face-making, with the performers never asked to do much more than be confused or offer degrees of exasperation. Easily the most annoyed is Eddie Nickerson’s Lloyd, the volatile director called on to put the messy “Nothing On” together before it tours the Styx.

The first act gives us rehearsing actors falling over lines and themselves. We can tell the future is hopeless but these folks don’t get it, at least not yet. By the second act, as we watch a performance from backstage a month later, anxiety has set in and everything is about to implode.

Besides the lousy script, the cast slam-dances through frayed alliances, petty grievances and uncooperative props, barely missing each other as they hustle up and down the backstage stairs. What starts out as funny turns labored, though. And when Lloyd wistfully mentions “Richard III,” which he’s simultaneously directing, the thought of a few moments of Shakespeare does sound bracing.

But it’s back to the shenanigans, with the third act revealing what “Nothing On” has devolved to, utter chaos.

At the forefront are Penelope VanHorne as Dotty, the weary actress playing a Cockney maid, R.C. Ormond’s tongue-tied Garry, Alicia Gomes’ bimboesque Brooke and Tom Royer’s forever-befuddled Frederick. A highlight is Bob Kokol, who gives Selsdon, that boozing old man of the boards, a charming obliviousness amid the wreckage.

Another of this production’s virtues is Ed Gates’ set. The front, “Nothing On’s” facade of a home with rooms for the cast to bumble in and out of, is well-done but just ordinary enough to qualify for a cheap traveling show.

The behind-the-scenes view is more interesting, as we get to see the skeleton of rough wood that makes up the walkways and the wings as the actors await their cues. Jean Tessier’s hazy lighting helps make for an environment where the threat isn’t only crashing lines but crashing bodies.

* “Noises Off,” Vanguard Theatre Ensemble, Curtis Theatre, 1 Civic Center Circle, Brea. Fridays and Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 2 p.m. Through June 10. $10 to $17. (714) 990-7722.