Noises Off at Playhouse, QPAC

What’s more fun than a comically flawless story about tragically flawed people? Nothing.

A clumsy brunette bombshell; an addled actress as the dotty housekeeper; an alcoholic septuagenarian in the role of a burglar. It was never going to be easy staging a bedroom farce with a mediocre cast, but pompous director Lloyd Dallas is having a crack.

You’ll cry with laughter and cringe with delight as you witness this company fray and fall apart. Onstage, it’s a whirl of slamming doors, missed cues, dropped lines and dropped trousers; backstage, it’s an even more confused and chaotic maelstrom of love triangles and trampled egos, and there’s no one without an axe to grind (or swing).

Playwright Michael Frayn’s classic meta-farce has been running all over the world since its 1982 premiere. Now, Queensland Theatre’s Artistic Director Sam Strong masterfully marshals an ensemble of the country’s top comics for a wickedly funny night.