There’s a moment in the Phamaly Theatre Company’s production of Larry Shue’s comedy “The Foreigner” where gesture completely replaces spoken communication.
Charlie Baker, an anxious Englishman with a deep-seated fear of social interaction, has convinced the residents and employees of a rural Georgia fishing lodge that he can’t speak a word of English. He’s seated at the breakfast table with Ellard Simms, a kindly but backward youth who works at the lodge, and the pair break into inspired pantomime. They wave their arms, they play with the napkins tied to their necks, they place plastic cups on their heads and revel in exaggerated facial expressions. For more than five minutes, Jeremy Palmer and Daniel Traylor (who play Charlie and Ellard respectively) draw laughs without a single word.
It’s an inspired, moving and funny moment in the show, a routine straight out of a Buster Keaton film that gets to the very heart of Shue’s comedy. Language can be tricky. Words can define someone’s personality, they can regulate how someone’s perceived by others and they can play a crucial role in one’s happiness and overall well-being.
That seems like a pretty deep theme for a comedy that never shies away from ridiculous. In the wrong hands, it’s a message that can easily get lost in the shuffle between cartoonish characters, slapstick and a constant stream of ridiculous gibberish-speak. But director Edith Weiss and the Phamaly cast never lose sight of the show’s deeper messages. In trademark Phamaly fashion, the troupe gets to the heart of the show and, more impressively, adds some new dimensions to a popular production that’s seen plenty of interpretations.
The basic premise of the show is simple enough. Indeed, it’s a comic twist that feels straightforward enough to serve as the basis of an episode of a sitcom. Baker arrives at Betty Meeks’ Fishing Lodge Resort, joined by his friend and fellow Englishman Staff Sgt. Froggy LeSueur (played with constant gusto by Phamaly newcomer Michael Leopard). He reveals his social hang-ups immediately. He feels trapped by conversations with others. He’s no good with people. His wife, who’s languishing in a hospital bed in England, has cheated on him dozens of times and he’s unhappy in his job as the editor of a science-fiction magazine. He’s terrified of the prospect of staying at the lodge in Georgia for two days without Froggy, who’s set to depart on other business.
LeSueur comes up with the perfect good-natured gambit to ease the pressure. He tells Betty Meeks (Kathi Wood) that his friend Charlie is a foreigner who can’t speak a word of English. The ploy to avoid conversation quickly turns into something more. Charlie becomes the silent confidant of Catherine Simms (Lyndsay Palmer), an heiress to a handsome sum and engaged to David Marshall Lee (Trenton Schindele), a shady preacher who reveals plans of stealing the lodge from Meeks. Charlie also becomes the student of Ellard, Catherine’s sweet but bumbling brother who’s been labeled a dummy by the rest of the lodge.
To the delight and wonder of the lodge, Charlie’s progress in learning English is rapid. He finds a new side of himself in his guise as the foreigner. He tells complex and dramatic stories in the fabricated language of his fabricated country. He formulates plans to save the lodge from falling into the hands of Lee and his associate Owen Musser (Jaime Lewis), a backwards bully who eventually reveals ties to the Klu Klux Klan. In abandoning his accent, his words and his background, Charlie forges a bold and fearless alter ego.
A lot of the humor in this piece depends on timing and delivery, and Weiss’ direction is spotless in picking up every cue. Palmer, a Phamaly veteran, shows a dynamic transition in his delivery as Charlie. Traylor follows up his strong performance as Seymour in Phamaly’s 2012 production of “Little Shop of Horrors” in an equally emotive performance, lending the character of Ellard pathos and heart. Wood is solid as Meeks, and Leopard shows off his decades of experience on the stage in his performance as Froggy. Palmer, Schindele and Lewis round out the ensemble with an expert sense of timing.
The performances make up for some of the more ridiculous moments in Shue’s text. And as with any show by Phamaly, the first theater company in the country to exclusively cast actors with disabilities, the troupe adds a deeper meaning to the show’s themes. When Shue’s comedy turns to serious questions of discrimination against blacks, Jews, foreigners and “others,” the scope of the bigotry seems to widen under the lens of this production.
It hits those who have a different way of speaking, those who have a different way of walking and moving. Shue’s messages about acceptance, language and “otherness,” buried among jokes about silly accents and nonsense words, suddenly feel deeper.
Reach reporter Adam Goldstein at agoldstein@aurorasentinel.com or 720-449-9707