`Hay Fever’ nothing to sneeze at

It has no particular plot, no scathing social commentary, no juicy characters, but Noel Coward’s play “Hay Fever,” which opened this week at Acadia Repertory Theatre in Somesville, is nothing to sneeze at. It relates the story of a weekend during which each of the four members of the self-absorbed Bliss family has invited a guest to their country home. The weekend moves swiftly into chaos as the Blisses are just too busy with their own screwy oddities, games and battles to pay any proper attention to their guests.

Pure fluff from lights up to lights down, this 1924 jape has all of the theatricality and little of the intricacy of so many of Coward’s works. As such, it offers some of the zaniest situations one could ever hope to convulse over.

Take, for instance, the moment when a stuffy English diplomat and a frail young flapper find themselves arriving separately but simultaneously at the Bliss country home. No one greets them or introduces them, but there they are: strangers from different worlds stuck in the most awkward of social circumstances.

“I hope the weather holds,” he plunks out. She quivers and nods.”There’s no place like England in the spring and summer,” he tries again. She peeps out an uncomfortable, “Yes.” The embarrassment fills gaps of time until he gets the idea to show her his Japanese cigarette holder.

None of that scintillating Coward repartee in this exchange, but onstage the scene — which was one of Coward’s favorites — has the potential to be infectiously funny.

The trickiest part of creating comedy from the absence of words (rather than the presence) is the timing. Even Coward said that the success of “Hay Fever” depends less on plot and action than upon “expert technique from each and every member of the cast.”

This is where Acadia Rep gets a bit sniffly — at least for devotees of Coward. The pace of the show is quick, but there just isn’t the facility with technique in this production.

There are, however, some solid performances which make the evening entertaining. Ted Cancila is fascinatingly fluid as the diplomat Richard Greatham, and Leslie D. Smith, as Sorel, comes closest of anyone in the cast to capturing the elegance and sophistication of her character. Plus, as an actor, Smith is vibrant and sincere.

But in general, Director Kenneth Stack washed the play with a farcical approach so that the actors attack their roles with the subtlety of a chain saw. Catherine Slusar as the matriarch Judith Bliss overzealously acts the part, and most of the surrounding cast members follow her example as if it were contagious. Alan Gallant as Sandy Tyrell, Keith Tralins as David Bliss, and Matthew Bernstein as Simon Bliss slip and slide between being fey and burlesque. Charm and magnetism — those Coward standards — are simply missing.

Margaret Roach, as Jackie Coryton, can be bland and difficult to hear, but she brightens up the stage with her smiles and, at the end, her determination. Ann Fellows, as the maid, seems to have more in common with a Dickens character than a Coward role as she tiptoes around the set and snarls out her lines.

Costumes by Karen Malm range from downright gorgeous to surprisingly tacky. The English country home set, which Stack built, preserves Acadia Rep’s tradition of picturesque realism. “Hay Fever” will be performed 8:15 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday through Aug. 6 and 2:15 p.m. Aug. 7 at Acadia Repertory Theatre in Somesville. The show will be repeated Aug. 30-Sept. 4. For tickets, call 244-7260.