HAIL TO THE FARCE AT CT. CABARET

                                         CHRIS BROOKS AND ASHLEY AYALA

We are a nation that loves to order things, all sorts of things, online, using the Internet as a giant shopping cart.  After purchasing, we eagerly await the mailman’s truck to arrive to deliver our highly anticipated goods so we can instantaneously be gratified and rewarded.  What happens, however, when what we order is not what we receive, if there is some disconnect between the buyer and the seller.  What do we do then?

Grab a catalogue or amazon.com wish list, and run over to Berlin’s intimately staged Connecticut Cabaret Theatre for a lesson in laughter as it speedily delivers a farce for your pleasure:  “No Sex Please, We’re British.”  Penned by Alistair Foot and Anthony Marriott, it was a rousing success in London’s West End when it opened in 1971.  

Even though the new bride Frances Hunter did not have access to the Internet or E-Bay for her shopping needs, she did take advantage of a mail order request for some sparkling Scandinavian glassware to furnish their apartment over the bank where her husband Peter works.  When the goblets fail to arrive, Frances, instead, finds herself the recipient of cases and cartons, envelopes and boxes of Scandinavian pornography.  Ashley Ayala’s sensible Frances takes the mistaken delivery in stride until her hubby Peter, a stoic Chris Brooks, points out if the off color material is found in their possession he could lose his job.  The situation becomes even more dire with the arrival of Peter’s mom, an inquisitive Rachel West-Balling, as well as two official bank executives played by Russell Fish and George Lombardo.

To solve their “blue” problem, Peter coerces his bank assistant Brian, an eager to please Chris Pearson, to save the day by either burning, drowning, burying or dumping the offensive material.  As the stakes climb and the situation looks like it is involving the police, in the personage of Dave Wall’s Lt. Paul, Brian becomes appropriately unhelpfully hysterical.

As the Hunter apartment becomes increasingly crowded, especially when you add in the happy hookers Susan (Maria Pompile) and Barbara (Brianna Zuk), this farce threatens to explode.  With anchovies and artwork, sleeping pills and parrots, ringing doorbells and threatened resignations, mistaken identities and misdirected missives, the newlyweds are overwhelmed with the mysteries of marital life.  Through it all, director Kris McMurray, CT Cabaret’s Artistic Director and owner, makes sure the laughter rolls merrily along.

For tickets ($30), call CT Cabaret Theatre, 31 Webster Square Road, Berlin at 860-829-1248 or online at www.ctcabaret.com.  Performances are Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., with doors opening at 7:15 p.m.  Remember this is cabaret, with food and drinks welcome or you can buy refreshments on site.  Now is the time to subscribe for next year’s season of two musicals and three comedies.

As doors slam and lies and fibs fly, watch how the newlyweds Frances and Peter keep their cool while chaos reigns.