Life's a beach in Indy Shakes' manic production of "The Comedy of Errors"

A comedy that poses the immediate threat of a foreigner's execution has a steep hill to climb toward the happy ending everyone expects in the genre. That's why Shakespeare's title of this early play is an important signal of what's needed for the audience to process a parade of implausibilities. Among comedies, then, this one is in a class by itself: "The Comedy of Errors." 

The saga of the twin Antipholuses displayed in IndyShakes production.

The Indianapolis Shakespeare Company has lopped off the title's definite article, perhaps so the play will appear more loosely generic.  And when Act A Foo Improv Crew appears in the marketing, potential attendees are justified in wondering if this is some sort of adaptation of Shakespeare's play. riffing on the theme of mistaken identity undergirded by verbal and game-playing spontaneity. 

Deliberate, rather than accidental,  mistakes of this kind have unfortunately become a serious matter. American citizens and those who are deemed to look like reprehensible foreigners are stamped as undesirables. It's the ICE Age. In "The Comedy of Errors," the hostility is narrowed to the enmity  between two Mediterranean towns, Ephesus and Syracuse. In this production, they are transported, as if in rough duplication, to Daytona Beach and Venice Beach, respectively, in the 1980s. Nolan Brokamp's set design makes imaginative use of  beach changing tents, a beverage vendor's stand, and one rather basic residence. 

Implausibly — but what isn't implausible in this scenario? — it's a capital offense for citizens of one place to appear in the other. Instead of Trumpian tariff barriers, there are statutes requiring ransom for any intruder from the other Beach to escape fatal condemnation. Thus Egeon, a Syracusan in the original, is forced to plead his case to the Ephesian ruler for a stay of the legal penalty. The loss of his wife, their twin sons and their twin servants has had unimaginable consequences, which a plot involving sex and money (perennial partners in crime, themes represented slyly by Kelli Thomas as Luciana and insistently by Scot Greenwell as the goldsmith Angelo) complicates far beyond sorting out who's who.

One of the cleverest things about this production is the pantomiming of the catastrophe at sea that has parted Egeon from his family and obscured their respective fates. The shaping narrative, well-managed in Zack Neiditch's performance Thursday night, thus becomes more intelligible with mirthful visual support. Long ago in "The Boys from Syracuse," the hit team of  Rodgers and Hart used a brisk opening chorus to clarify the problem. 

In the IndyShakes show, other place names are changed, and repeated references to "HoJo's"

Sisters Luciana (Kelli T'homas) and Adriana (Alicia Sims) talk about men. 

have the whiff of product placement. Allusions to Cancun help place the essential references to rescue from shipwreck, the Caribbean standing in for the Mediterranean. A reference to "Lapland sorcerers," a topical labeling known to Shakespeare's audience, here becomes "Cleveland sorcerers," a choice mysterious to me (did they set that river afire?)  The Courtesan so deftly enacted by Cynthia Collins is a New York transplant, sounding for all the world like Adelaide in "Guys and Dolls." 

There are extra-Shakespearean verbal tweaks to the script, especially the now-global "Okay," that convey the modernization. There are a few totally unnecessary repetitions of "Shit!" But an alphabet game at the very start helps smooth the way, not so much for understanding "The Comedy of Errors" as for justifying Act a Foo's signature style, to be interpolated playfully in the second act with one of those audience-participation games improv troupes rely on.

Florida beach life, with the insular cultural norms intact, is  suitable to the kind of confusion that prevails until the effortful untying of knots at the end. The resolution may be forced, but it is still moving when Lynne Perkins's Abbess casts balm upon the perplexed, overwrought  assemblage. Her personal link to the pairs of twins and the distraught Egeon is also revealed. 

The main problem with  the Act a Foo episode moments earlier is that it privileges the farcical elements over the comedic essence of the show. It's important in "The Comedy of Errors" that family values are upheld, an emphasis that farce doesn't bother with. Co-directors Rob and Jen Johansen deserve credit for generating the madcap antics (especially of the Dromios, Kelsey Van Voorst and Hannah Boswell). But they also conclusively center "The Comedy of Errors" on its happy ending, keyed to Perkins' mastery of her role. 

The leading-man twins, each named Antipholus, are capably performed by Andrew Martin (Venice Beach) and Carlos Medina Maldonado (Daytona Beach). Adriana, the Venice Antipholus' distraught wife, is played with a nice blend of hurt and indignation by Alicia Sims. 

Both Antipholuses assign the ongoing misunderstandings to magic in a world where conspiracy theories merge with local gossip, as they have always tended to do. Credulity will forever be a powerful force. There is "neither rhyme nor reason" to it, to quote the Bard in his most enduring phrase from this show. The production continues this weekend, ending Saturday.

[Photos by Torrie Hudson]