This piece by Ken Ludwig is perfect community theatre fare. It has all the qualities of one of those British parlor comedies, but without the bad accents and the box set. A primary and secondary love interest, a couple of comedic characters, a fun-and-not-particularly-believable plot, and a quick pace to hold the audience's interest. It all takes place in the 1930s, where the Warner Brothers are producing a movie version of A Midsummer Night's Dream. Then a couple of faires drop in. No, not RuPaul and friends... actual fairies from the Shakespeare play. The "real" Oberon and Puck mistakenly wind up on the set and are mistaken for actors in the movie. When they bring out the flower that caused all the trouble in the original play... well, you get the picture.

JAMES JORDAN (Oberon) and BRETT LEVANTO (Puck) steal the show. If these two characters weren't on stage as much as they are, the show would probably fall quite flat. Both have wonderful stage presence and command of their bodies - vital qualities when playing Shakespearean roles. Jordan's Oberon reminded me of a younger, thinner James Earl Jones, especially in vocal tone. He was a bit too young for the role (a bit more experience would've added more depth), but his performance turned out a very powerful King of the Fairies.

Levanto's Puck was exactly what I imagine Shakespeare would create if he was writing in modern times. Quick witted and funny, Levanto was the axis of every scene he was in without hamming it up or stealing focus from his fellow actors. Bravo to both of these lead men.

The rest of the cast was a mixture of community theatre experience levels, and well-cast for their roles. LAURA OLIVER's ditsy blonde seemed modeled on Lina Lamont in Singin' In The Rain, just with a slightly less-selfish personality. Oliver was good at being bad, so it was a little hard to tell if that was acting or just the real thing. Which is as it should be, I suppose. KEVIN MARTINGAYLE as Will Hayes was rather unremarkable at first. Then later in the show (while Hayes is under a spell making him fall in love with himself),

all of a sudden it seemed like I was watching George W. Bush as he would've been if he'd even done theatre

The rest of the company was well-cast, as I said. The weaker actors were put into roles that were supposed to be weaker actors (according to the script), so sections that could have been torturous in another show were merely endured in this one. There were some tense moments (mostly toward the end) where apparently someone forgot their line(s), but hopefully those problems will correct themselves as the run continues.

BOB NELSON's set was mostly right on target. My main concern was that the office area (a raised platform with some furniture and an inward-opening door) was a bit too small for the number of actors it had to contain at one time. This made for some awkward blocking moments, especially when trying to negotiate around the various pieces of furniture and the open door. Since the show spends so little time in the office anyway, it might have been better to simply bring a desk onstage for the office scenes and use that space in other ways. Other than that, the design was actually quite good.

Lighting and costumes were pretty basic and servicable. Technically, this show was well put together. That is, except for sound. The sound was, well... bad. Some of the bits were certainly not the best choices, others were cut off before they finished. Most were too loud, except for the phone ringer, which came from onstage, not through the speakers, and was so quiet in relation to the rest of the cues and the action on stage that when the actors reacted to it, I didn't know what they were reacting to at first. I can only hope that perhaps these sound cues were just added recently and there wasn't yet time to tweak.

In general, the entire cast needs to up the pace, the energy, and the projection. Perhaps it was nerves, but some sections dragged to a crawl and there were numerous times I had trouble hearing the lines. This problem is even worse when the mulitude of planes fly overhead. With a few exceptions, it seemed more nervous than fun. Now that they're ready to open, the entire cast needs to relax, pick up cues, and most of all, HAVE FUN.

Shakepeare in Holloywood is two hours long, including intermission. It runs September 15 through October 8, 2006. For reservations, call 428-9233.