One of three resident companies at Bowie Playhouse, 2nd Star chose a winner in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, a production that director Jane Wingard said "took 7,000 volunteer hours to put together," explaining that "comedy is hard, as the actors endure long rehearsals to learn the music, dances and their lines."
A smart choice to open the newly renovated theater, the show is filled with Roman slapstick and catchy tunes set to clever lyrics. Forum debuted on Broadway in 1962, becoming the first show in which Stephen Sondheim served as both composer and lyricist, with book by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart. The writers brought back puns, mistaken identities and cross-dressing that were first explored in 200 B.C. by playwright Titus Maccius Plautus, who exposed human foibles to his long-ago Roman audiences.
Often hilarious, Forum arrived decades before political correctness and is likely to offend senior and feminist segments of any audience.
Sondheim created a tuneful farce that began with "Comedy Tonight" - maybe the wittiest opener ever - that promises "Something familiar, something peculiar, Something for everyone: a comedy tonight / Something appealing, something appalling, Something for everyone: a comedy tonight," later adding "Nothing with gods, nothing with fate: Weighty affairs will just have to wait! / Nothing that's formal, nothing that's normal, No recitations to recite: Open up the curtain; comedy tonight!" This same tune is reprised to close the show.
Director Wingard has gathered an energetic 2nd Star cast to play a unique assortment of crafty slaves, lascivious masters, eunuchs, courtesans, soldiers and virginal young lovers. The show is briskly paced with the help of skilled choreographer Christine Asero and the terrific pit orchestra led by Don Smith. Wingard does double duty as set designer, creating a believable ancient Roman neighborhood.
Brian Douglas is perfectly cast as slave Pseudolus, winning the audience instantly with his strong delivery of the opening "Comedy Tonight" and other tunes, smoothly guiding the action while conveying the slave's yearning for freedom and his relish of outwitting his masters.
