Lyn Dowling| Florida Today
The weekend before “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder” is scheduled to open (this Friday)at the Cocoa Village Playhouse, directors and cast members grab a few minutes to talk as they get short breaks from rehearsal, .
It is a fascinating musical comedy, they say, and one that is worthy of all the honors it has received: three Tony Awards, including Best Musical, and seven Drama Desk Awards, among other plaudits, in 2014. It is fast, with a single actor (James Spiva) portraying multiple members of the same family, and all the changes that go with them. It is hilarious, not merely because it contains certain farce-like aspects, but because its humor is wickedly sophisticated. And it is challenging.
“Oh yes,” playhouse Artistic Director Staci Hawkins-Smith says with a sigh. “We’ve started work on ‘Louis Armstrong’s Wonderful World (which will be presented June 28 through 30) and rehearsing ‘A Gentleman’s Guide’ at the same time, so we’re trying to do a lot. This is a complicated, challenging show, and the biggest challenge is the music. It is difficult.”
Spiva, who plays the D’Ysquith family, uses nearly identical words: “It is a challenge, probably the most complex thing I’ve ever done.”
What makes it complex is the story: In 1907, Montagu “Monty” Navarro (Angel Santiago), an Englishman living in a shabby flat in London, is informed his late mother was a member of the aristocratic D’Ysquith family and he is ninth in line to inherit the earldom of Highhurst. His amour, Sibella Hallward (Caroline Brown), will not marry him because of his low standing. His request for a job and acceptance by the family is rudely turned down.
He tries to plead his case with another D’Ysquith, a drunken minister, but after the clergyman falls, it occurs to Monty that allowing it to happen will bring him one step closer to the earldom. One by one, he does away with each D’Ysquith who stand between him and the title, each more non-likeable than the next, and each in a most clever way.
“My favorite is the beekeeper,” associate director Pamela Larson says, laughing as she speaks. “Monty discovers that a certain number of bee stings will kill you, and that bees are attracted to lavender, so he sprays the man with lavender and the bees sting him to death. The way it happens is so funny.”
It is not, all involved agree, slapstick.
“It’s anything but. This is tremendously sophisticated humor: not bathroom humor and it’s not over-graphic about the way the victims die. In fact, the murders are kind of fun. As long as you follow the story, you can’t help but laugh,” Larson says.
“It is very highbrow and highly intelligent,” Brown adds.
It also is a guide to love and murder.
Brown says Sibella “finds herself caught between what she thinks she wants and what her heart wants. She . . . ends up being the hero in the end.”
Even for a singer like Brown, a first soprano who was a protégé of the late tenor Louis Roney at the University of Central Florida, the music of the musical comedy is the most trying aspect of the thing.
“It is kind of like an operetta because so much of it is sung, and James (Spiva) is brilliant,” she says. “He sings in every range, as a man and as a woman. He picks up the nuances of each character and makes it brilliant. I think he’s probably the most talented person on Brevard County stages.”
Spiva, who has appeared in several stage productions but probably is best known as the front man for the popular local band Hot Pink, joked about the multiple, fast costume changes, for which costumer Dan Hill has specially designed easy-out-easy-in clothing and a temporary changing booth offstage, agreed that the real test is of his vocal range, but bringing uniqueness to each D’Ysquith is right there too.
“Adalbert, the earl, who outlives the rest of his family, only to die later, is really the least classy man you can imagine,” he says. “He is the one Monty does not murder, yet he is the one whose death results in Monty being (arrested).”
Hawkins-Smith brushes off the exhaustion.
“This is a show that is going to appeal to a certain audience,” she says. “If you like intelligent humor and good music, see it.”
“A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder”
When: 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and Thursday, March 14; 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays March 8 through 24
Where: Cocoa Village Playhouse, 300 Brevard Ave., Cocoa
Cast: Angel Santiago as Monty Navarro;James Spiva, the D’Ysquith Family; Caroline Brown, Sibella Howard; Cathy Moubray, Phoebe D’Ysquith; Kari Ryan, Evangeline Barley; Brenda Sheets, Miss Marietta Shingle; and Jennifer Johnson, Lady Eugenia D’Ysquith
Tickets: $24 to $32 (children $18)
Online: www.cocoavillageplayhouse.com
Call: 321-636-5050
