Theatre Guild Serves Up Big Helping of Farce

In Ken Ludwig's Leading Ladies, life isn't going so well for Shakespearean actors Leo Clark and Jack Gable. They've been forced to perform on the Bull Moose Lodge circuit, and money is tighter than a girdle. So, when they read in the paper about a large inheritance for two nephews who can't be found, they decide to impersonate the nephews and claim the inheritance for themselves.

But a farce piles conflict on conflict. Just minutes before their train stops in the town where they have gone to collect the money they learn that it's not nephews who are being sought, but nieces. Thinking quickly, they don female garb from their costume chest and impersonate the missing nieces instead. And, as they say, hilarity ensues.

All farce contains some common denominators. The situations the characters find themselves in are fun and improbable, and the more extravagant, the better. There are disguises and mistaken identities, quick entrances and exits and lightning-fast humor, as well as lighting-fast costume changes.

Leading Ladies, playing at the Theatre Guild of Webster Groves, Friday through March 20, adds the difficulty and absurdity of fast costume changes from male to female and back again.

“I've been practicing my costume changes for about a week,” said Matt Lindquist, who plays Jack Clark. “We don't have time to go to the dressing room to change; we do it right offstage.”

The two lead actors agree that the costume changes present a challenge.

“I've had two real tries at the costume changes,” said Jason Meyers, who plays Jack Gable in the show. “I'm at about 80 percent of where I need to be. It's harder to change back into a man. Of course, we don't have to put on panty hose and garters changing into women.”

Both Lindquist and Meyers have performed at the Theatre Guild of Webster Groves before, but, as is often the case with community theatre actors, they have separate careers away from acting. Lindquist is a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner, which he describes as being "like a psychiatrist but with stricter controls," and Meyers is an attorney specializing in pretrial evidentiary analysis, hardly positions that give them the opportunity to dress in women's clothing. Or do they?

“No,” both of the actors say simultaneously. But methinks the ladies doth protest too much. Finally, Meyers cracks under the pressure. “The last time I was wearing a dress I was when I was being inducted into the International Thespian Society,” he said. “It always involves someone making you dress up like a woman—kind of a hazing thing.”

Cross-dressing issues aside, Lindquist and Meyers both enjoy performing in a farce, which is known for being tolerant of highly transgressive behavior, whether it's dressing up as women, cheating on your spouse or engaging in a criminal scam.

“It let's you point out people's ridiculousness,” Meyers said. “But instead of pointing it out blatantly, you can just portray it in a way in which the audience might recognize their foibles.”

Lindquist concurred. “In a farce, you can get away with whatever you want to get away with—just have fun,” he said. “I've also worked as a puppeteer, and in a way, in a farce you act like a puppet.”

Both actors say Leading Ladies is a well written show, filled with laughs that come at the audience in rapid succession.

“The play moves very fast,” Meyers said. “It will be over before you realize it.”

Lindquist offered his opinion of why the audience will enjoy the show. “If you like Shakespeare or Billy Wilder, you'll like it.”

What: Leading Ladies, by Ken Ludwig

When: Friday-Sunday; March 17-20, 2011

Where: Theatre Guild of Webster Groves, 517 Theatre Lane, Webster Groves, MO.

Tickets: Available at the door the night of performance only