The Producers

The key to a good Mel Brooks show is broad, raucous farce and a high giggle rating for jokes about sex, bodily functions and ethnic stereotypes. These are skills that Runaway Stage Productions brings—along with a wink-wink-nudge-nudge self-ironizing attitude—to their latest offering, The Producers, directed by Bob Baxter.

The musical, based on Brooks’ 1967 film of the same name, is the tale of a hack Broadway producer, Max Bialystock (Brent Null), and an accountant with a fondness for musical theater, Leo Bloom (Tyson Wheeler), who discover that they can actually make more money on a flop than on a hit. They set out to perpetrate a fraud, raising $2 million (Max schtups rich and lonely little old ladies for the money) to produce Springtime for Hitler, a guaranteed flop.

Except it isn’t, and our ethically impaired heroes are on the hook for fraud.

The show relies on its leads for both chemistry and humor, and Null and Wheeler come through. Null’s blustering, obnoxious Max is exactly what we’d look for, equally incompetent as a con man and a producer. Meanwhile, Wheeler’s Leo is trying desperately to avoid anxiety attacks and become inured to deceit, all the while falling for the beautiful—and tuneful—Ulla (Jennifer Zimny).

But the scene-stealing performances here truly belong to Matthew Rives as Franz Liebkind, the Nazi pigeon-keeper who authors Springtime for Hitler in an effort to rehabilitate der Führer’s reputation, and Darryl Stroh-De Herrrera, who puts the swish in director Roger DeBris, while also choreographing the show with Amy Jacques-Jones. Both have a strong grip on the power of farce and no apparent concern for embarrassment.

While the sets are a bit on the flimsy side—and seemed to be a bit difficult to deal with—the production benefits, as usual, from a wonderful live orchestra, under the direction of Glenn Disney. The production is funny, provided one is not easily offended.

But that’s kinda what Mel Brooks is all about.