The door-slamming farce Lend Me a Tenor leads off Appleseed’s theater slate

Ken Ludwig’s Lend Me a Tenor opened on Broadway only 20 years ago, but it feels like a farce from many years earlier, like perhaps 1934, the year in which it is set. That’s because contemporary playwright Ludwig has consciously modeled himself after two supreme Georges, Kaufman and Feydeau. Improving on the French master, Ludwig has six instead of five doors, and he demands that they be slammed more often and more loudly than in Georges Feydeau. Like George S. Kaufman, Ludwig skewers the vanity, ambitions and fatuousness of the privileged classes, but many of his lines are snappier. Tenor, regularly performed around the world in more than two dozen languages, provides the consistently amusing kickoff to Appleseed Productions’ new season, at the Atonement Lutheran Church, 116 W. Glen Ave.

Lend Me a Tenor does come with a plot, and there is even some plot tension, but most of the comedy arises from characters playing against themselves, as in commedia dell’arte. The explosive manager of the Cleveland Grand Opera, Saunders (Lanny Freshman, Family Times’ very own Dr. Lanny), is holding a hotel reception for the world’s greatest tenor, Tito Merelli (Matt Nilsen), who is about to appear in the local opera house. The veins on Saunders’ neck begin to bulge when it appears that Merelli will not arrive on time, and he turns to his much put-upon assistant Max (Terence LaCasse) for solutions. Recognizing that the unseen understudy is unacceptable, as is a star-struck bellhop (Alan D. Stillman), Max agrees to take on the job of singing the title role of Verdi’s Otello himself. In taking on this impossible task he hopes to impress Saunders’ lovely daughter Maggie (Anne Freund), who has opened the scene by swooning over one of Merelli’s recordings.

Despite reports, the great tenor himself does indeed arrive, but suffers much under the acid tongue of his harridan wife Maria (Binaifer Dabu). Complications rise further when Maria departs in a snit and Merelli is despondent, possibly even suicidal. Somebody dressed in a costume with blackface sings the role with success, while another person in the identical costume tries to break into the theater after hours. The soprano singing the role of Desdemona, Diana (Sarah Reid), is smitten with the tenor in the leading role and shows up at the hotel room looking for some late-night nooky. Necessary also is Julia (B.J. Newsome), Saunders’ wife and Maggie’s mother, a grande dame whom the husband compares with the Statue of Liberty.

Nora O’Dea’s scenic design neatly divides the stage right down the middle into co-equal halves, with one slamming door between the right and left half. One side is supposed to be a reception room while the other is a bedroom, but they are sufficiently alike to allow for parallel actions in the two halves. Better yet, as the door between the two sides can be closed, we often see actions on one side that are denied to the other, such as people escaping the scene or a scantily clad young woman preparing for a bath.

While a good deal of Ludwig’s humor is verbal, with Lanny Freshman’s Saunders getting many of the best lines, far more of it relies on ancient devices deriving from Roman comedy, like mistaken identity. Devices that were updated in the 1930s by the Marx Brothers, like having two characters dressed in the same costumes miming each other as if looking in a mirror, pop up here. Anyone with any knowledge of the play knows this scene is coming, but it is amazing how well it still works.

Unlike Kaufman or Feydeau, Ludwig also introduces some erotic comedy when the two younger women, Maggie and Diana, reveal some G-rated skin, one in her skivvies, the other in a bath towel. Increasing the symmetry, both damsels think they are romancing the same tenor.

Although still a young man, Terence LaCasse has been playing ambitious go-getters for what seems like a decade. Only he’s doing it differently, indicating more restraint and subtler interpretation from his recent instruction in Le Moyne College’s theater program. Lanny Freshman’s reliable delivery of Ludwig’s crackling good lines is what many community theater directors are looking for. By adopting a wide-stepping, heavy-footed gait, Binaifer Dabu manages to look about six inches taller than her 4-foot-11 height and readily steals every scene she’s in. In the relatively thankless role of Julia, B.J. Newsome presents a fluttery Margaret Dumont partially inhabited by Spring Byington.

When it comes to Italian accents, Matt Nilsen gains much by speaking slowly. But Dabu, LaCasse and Alan D. Stillman speak and sing Italian as if they had at least been practicing with audio tapes in the car.

Farce calls for speed rather than a light touch, and that’s what director Dan Stevens delivers for Lend Me a Tenor. He even closes the show with the farcical convention of having the players run through all their paths at triple the pace.

This production runs through Sept. 26. See Times Table for information.