DO NOT MISS the funniest show of the season now blowing up at LYRIC STAGE BOSTON: SOMETHING ROTTEN! I walked in casually and left hysterically laughing at the lunatic exuberance of this uproarious production– a mad, musical theater send-up directed by Ilana Ransom Toeplitz in her Lyric Stage debut. May it be the beginning of a long collaboration!
Set in Renaissance England 1595, SOMETHING ROTTEN!’s book by Karey Kirkpatrick & John O’Farrell finds the Bottom Brothers, Nick and Nigel, true to their name. The odd-couple sibs played by Ryan Mardesich and Ohad Ashkenazi are a second rate plugger and a goofy first rate poet trying to write a new play that will better the best playwright in the land–“Will with the skill to thrill with the quill” SHAKESPEARE! Jared Troilo as the Bard is a beaut! He’s the Elizabethan Elvis, all swiveling hips and swaggering wonderfulness, occasionally taking a moment to bemoan the burden of his epic celebrity. He brings the house down crooning “Hard to Be the Bard”!
Meanwhile, in order to get a jump on inspiration, Nick consults a cockeyed Nostradamus (the hilarious Joy Clark) who peers into the future and distills the scrambled outlines of Shakespeare’s biggest hit which seems to focus on breakfast: “omelette,” “ham,” and “Danish.” Thus inspired, the Brothers Bottom are off and running in pursuit of a dramaturgical form ahead of its time, something called a MUSICAL!
The stage is now set for a cavalcade of music and lyrics by those clever Kirkpatrick brothers Wayne & Karey, propelling a slew of crazy production numbers! From tap dancing eggs to show-stopping spoofs of Broadway musicals: Cats to Chorus Line, Fiddler to Phantom, the production careens on the talents of the most exceptional ensemble of singers and dancers in town! I’m talking flawless vocals and comic timing–especially Kristian Espiritu as Nick’s multi- talented wife “Bea”–plus killer choreography by Christopher Shin, and a live orchestra (Music director Katya Stanislavskaya)!
Along the way a riot of references and characters find their way into the action: Jewish investor Shylock (Bobbie Steinbach), lovesick Portia (Lauren Dodds) swooning over Nigel’s sonnets on his way to actually cooking up HAMLET, which Shakespeare promptly steals thus proving “To Thine own self” he is duplicitously true. The plotting may be overripe, but SOMETHING ROTTEN!– a Boston Theater Critics Association CRITICS’ PICK –is a delicious omelette of hilarious proportions and a lot more than it’s cracked up to be! DON’T MISS at LYRIC STAGE BOSTON through JUNE 7!
