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Stage West's comedy traces efforts to be, not be, Hamlet

Those who missed the big Friends finale on Thursday to see opening night of I Hate Hamlet at Stage West Community Playhouse can console themselves that the live play was a similar, but, ultimately, more rewarding experience.

I Hate Hamlet is a lot like a situation comedy, with the characters involved in a ludicrous set of circumstances. But I Hate Hamlet's biting barbs at the values of TV land and the pretentions of the live stage put the show a few rungs up on the theater ladder.

And, as done by the Stage West players, it is a pleasantly satisfying experience.

The situation is that actor Andrew Rally (Jay Ingle) has just wound up a stint on the television show L.A. Medical as Dr. Jim Corman, Rookie Surgeon, and gone back east to look for his acting roots. Right off the bat, and thanks to his hunky TV image, he lands the title role in New York's Shakespeare in the Park production of Hamlet.

Problem is, like Garth and Wayne on Saturday Night Live's Wayne's World, Andrew doesn't feel worthy. This is Hamlet, for heaven's sake. And he's a mere television guy.

By good fortune, he has moved into the apartment where once lived the late, great actor, John Barrymore. His real estate agent Felicia Dantine (Gloria Grieco), whose sideline is conjuring the spirits, calls up Barrymore's ghost (George Friel). The ghost vows to turn Andrew into a credible Hamlet.

This is quite a challenge, as Andrew howls that he hates Hamlet.

So far, it's only a situation, and with all the paeans of praise for the legitimate stage, it looks to be a pretty stuffy one.

Then arrives Hollywood talent agent Gary Peter Lefkowitz (Paul Nessler), who shamelessly voices the secret feelings both Andrew and Barrymore harbor: the stage is okay for "English guys who can't get a series," but sensible people go for the big bucks on a tacky TV series. In real life, that's similar to what Barrymore did - went to Hollywood, did forgettable roles and reveled in the dough.

Nessler's character is a "supporting" role, but without him, and without Nessler's terrific rendition of him, this play wouldn't rise above your average sitcom. It's his audacious expression of what everybody else is thinking that gives this play its hilarious moments.

"Shakespeare is like algebra on stage," Lefkowitz declares. And most people don't know enough to know whether someone is doing Shakespeare well or not.

When Andrew defends live theater, Lefkowitz is ready.

"You don't do art," he says. "You buy it." And then you sell it for a big profit.

To Lefkowitz, it's television that is perfect art: You can eat while you watch it, you don't have to pay all that much attention to it, and if the performers and/or the show are no good, nobody even notices or cares. It doesn't ruin careers or viewership.

This isn't to say that Lefkowitz is all there is to the play; he's just the catalyst that makes it get up and go.

Friel is sublime as the lofty, self-indulgent Barrymore, his diction perfect, his voice resonating, his gestures dramatic, but not overly so. Ingle is sweetly appealing as the conflicted Andrew. These are two characters who could easily be overplayed, but director Saul Leibner helps his actors to keep them nicely in control.

Ms. Grieco is memorable as the braying Noo Yawk real estate agent, and Megan Perry makes a believeable innocent as Andrew's eternally-virginal girlfriend Deirdre. Mollie Lutz is charming as New York talent agent Lillian Troy, who once bedded Barrymore, but her performance would be improved with better voice projection.

Betsy Glasson's set design looks good, and Sig Stock's crew built it to work. Dylan Friel's lighting is well-timed, but sometimes a tad too obvious.

I Hate Hamlet can appeal to everyone, but Shakespeare lovers will especially like the way playwright Paul Rudnick weaves lines from the Bard's plays into the dialogue and even uses the titles to his plays for some clever repartee.

I Hate Hamlet, weekends through May 23 at Stage West Community Playhouse, 8390 Forest Oaks Blvd., Spring Hill. Tickets are $14. Call 352 683-5113 or buy online at TicketLeap on Stage West's Web site, www.stagewest.net