Mocking the Detectives
Minneapolis’s Steven Epp returns to Berkeley Rep for the umpteenth time with some Dario Fo hijinks, and my review is on KQED Arts.
The Doctor Is Outrageous
In reviewing theater, all too often I have to call out a production for playing the comedy too broadly in a way that just seems clumsy. The humor in Steven Epp’s latest show at Berkeley Repertory Theatre is broad as can be, but it’s so well executed by the cast of eight that it’s usually flat-out hysterical even if it doesn’t bear much thinking about. A Doctor in Spite of Himself is a 1666 comedy by Molière (the artist seldom known as Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) that star Epp and director Christopher Bayes have considerably revamped and updated in a way that only ramps up the hilarity. The play’s a satire about doctors being a pack of frauds, and Epp and compatriots accentuate the already ample farcical element to elephantine proportions, shifting the focus to the common idiocy of humankind.
