Does your side hurt? It’s their ‘Fawlty’ Ten Bucks delights with Brit-com blend

Ten Bucks Theatre Company likes to laugh in the winter. “We try to do an outrageous comedy in January because we think it’s unfair to ask an audience to come out in the cold to see something depressing,” said Julie Arnold Lisnet, a founding member of the Brewer-based grass-roots group. Last Friday, the company had the largest opening-night house since its 2001 debut in – when else? – January. (For the record, that inaugural show was the black comedy: Tom Stoppard’s “The Real Inspector Hound.”)

This week, the show that’s bringing out the crowds (the Sunday matinee was also the best-attended matinee in the theater’s history) is “An Evening of Fawlty Towers Meets Monty Python,” which runs through Sunday, Feb. 6, at the Brewer Middle School Auditorium. Based on two BBC series, “Fawlty Towers” and “Monty Python and the Flying Circus,” that played on American TV in reruns during the 1970s, this production re-creates some of the funniest situation and sketch comedy an entire generation of late-night watchers knows by heart. Nudge-nudge, know what I mean?

The evening in the title refers to three “Fawlty” episodes, which run between 30 and 40 minutes each, and five short “Python” sketches, the shortest of which is “Silly Walker,” in which dancer Keith Robinson high-steps across the length of the stage, realizes he’s in the wrong skit and exits in the same goofy manner. The walk was originally made famous by the 6-foot-5 John Cleese, who was on both TV shows and whose long limbs probably have elicited the most attention in the history of leg humor. But Robinson is funny, too.

The Ten Bucks actors, directed in turns by Tamela Glenn, Allen Adams and John Greenman, and brilliantly supported by Chez Cherry’s multi-room set, are universally up for this daunting and daring theatrical event. For the most part, they keep up the fast pace and intensity that marked both TV shows, and they provide nicely drawn characters – based on their predecessors but fresh enough to be homage rather than pure imitation. Purists may catch themselves thinking: “That’s not the way it was done!” And the few unfortunate instances of miming are more distracting than useful. But the show is a gas, even if there’s an uncomfortable sense that TV culture is thriving even in live theaters.

It would be easy enough to say that Robert Libbey, as the underdog Basil Fawlty, and Ron Adams, as his literal-minded Spanish waiter, own this show. They are exceptional comic actors, and wherever they go – walk, tumble or crawl – the guffaws follow.

But that would be an incomplete assessment of the talent in this smartly choreographed production, which includes pratfalls, wrestling, and “swordplay” with a wooden spoon and mop. Hillary Roberts, as Polly, Julie Arnold Lisnet as Sybil Fawlty, and Tim Pugliese as the chef Terry, hold down the fort with their steady work. They often make it possible for Libbey and Adams to shine, and that’s laudable straight-guy skill.

In addition to being perfectly annoying, A.J. Mooney, as the irascible Mrs. Richards, turns in a stage fall that’s so smooth she could be on ice. Pugliese returns, as do the supporting cast members, for amusing “Python” skits including “The Dead Parrot Sketch” with Adams. And Greenman, who plays the doddering Major Gowen, as well as a Pepperpot in the “Penguin on the Tellie,” sharply exploits his own comic abilities.

Of the “Python” lineup, my favorite was “The Argument Clinic,” with Nick Willette, Jenny Bragdon, Paul O’Reilly, George Bragdon and Robinson, in another of his cameo appearances. In this brief routine, a man pays money for a five-minute argument, and the mix-ups that ensue put him through an outlandish but somehow recognizable system of abuse and complaints.

The audience was so eager and rapt during the Sunday performance that it is impossible to name which of the “Fawlty” stories – “Communication Problems,” “The Anniversary” or “Basil the Rat” – was the most hilarious. The first was the most successful, but all three worked on many levels. And of course, a willing audience feeds comedy. If there’s a laugher in the hall, then it’s that much more fun.

Some of the humor is out of date, and someone in the audience will be appalled by the depiction of a Spaniard, by the wife-hating sentiments, and the sexual innuendo – all of which pre-date political correctness. But thankfully, Ten Bucks has not tried to reckon with this. The script is what it is.

And now for something completely different: A little history. Fawlty Towers, for those who don’t know, is a low-rate seaside hotel where pandemonium rules as its owners, Basil and Sybil, try to please customers and keep the business rolling while navigating through a stormy marriage. It was the creation of Cleese, in his post-“Python” days, and his then-wife, the American actor Connie Booth (who also played Polly on the series). The team developed only 12 episodes, which were so labor-intensive that Cleese said he ran out of steam. Originally aired on BBC without commercial breaks and eventually on public TV in this country, the show won many awards and is considered both a sitcom and a cult classic.

American TV screenwriters have tried three times to recreate its success on this side of the pond: “Amanda’s” with Bea Arthur, “Payne” with John Larroquette, and “Snavely Manor” with Harvey Korman (the only one that fizzled after the pilot).

Why reinvent the wheel? Ten Bucks has it right. Forget the tellie. Keep the dead parrot.

Ten Bucks Theatre Company will present “An Evening of Fawlty Towers Meets Monty Python” 8 p.m. Feb. 4 and 5, and 2 p.m. Feb. 6 at Brewer Middle School Auditorium, 5 Somerset St. For information, call 884-1030. Alicia Anstead can be reached at 990-8266 and aanstead@bangordailynews.net.