Gags, gimmicks drain charm from ‘The Inspector General’

Adaptations of classic plays must always be approached with the knowledge they might not be true to the intention of the playwright. The Actors Group production of “The Inspector General,” described in the playbill as “adapted by Oisin O’Sullivan” and “based on” the play by Nikolai Gogol, is a case in point.

Gogol wrote a brilliant political comedy that satirizes greed, opportunism and human stupidity in general: A stranger arrives in a provincial Russian town and is assumed by the locals to be an undercover government investigator. He is wined, dined and bribed accordingly.

TAG’s production leaves Gogol’s premise intact, but as directed by Enda O. Breadon, the show is more about the director than about Gogol. Rather than let Gogol’s work stand on its own merits as comedy and political commentary, Breadon lards on slow-paced slapstick and annoyingly cartoonish acting. As with Oscar Wilde’s classic comedy, “The Importance of Being Earnest,” a current Hawaii Pacific University production, Gogol’s work needs no add-on sight gags or distracting casting gimmicks to entertain modern audiences.

Breadon’s decision to cast women in two of the major male roles mirrors Joyce Maltby’s casting of a man in one of the major female roles in the HPU production of “Earnest.” However, in contrast to the latter show, Breadon has Su Yates (The Governor) and Bettina Adragna (Dobchinsky) play their roles without any distracting mugging or other annoying antics.

The use of hand puppets to represent several minor characters is a clever expedient. The puppets, designed by University of Hawaii graduate student Nicole DesLauriers, are cute and colorful. A puppet is also used to portray one of the secondary characters, but the idea would work better there if the puppet was treated as a person — as the other puppets are — rather than being tossed around like a dirty sock.

Two scenes show what this production could have been with a bit more focus on Gogol’s story and less use of gratuitous sight gags and anachronisms.

In one the stranger, Khlestakov (Joshua Behn), can’t decide whether he wants to seduce the governor’s wife (Michele Van Hessen) or his barely legal daughter, Marya (Ailia Hopkins), and tries to seduce both of them. Van Hessen plays the wife as a lusty battle-axe ready and willing to enjoy the services of a young stud. Hopkins plays the daughter as innocent yet innately corruptible. The scene displays Hopkins’ talents as a comedian to good effect. Behn plays most of the scene with his pants around his ankles.

Several other cast members contribute to the success of another scene. Behn, Adragna, Michael Brown Bick, Demetrius Jones and Rick Mura­kami portray a kaleidoscopic collection of townspeople who congratulate the governor and his family on Marya’s engagement to Khlestakov. The costumes and characterizations become more fragmentary and more ridiculous as the scene progresses, but this is the one place in the show where silliness and exaggerated acting add to the entertainment value rather than detract from it.