Theater review: Reduced Shakespeare Company sends up Hollywood at Kennedy Center

By Celia Wren
Thursday, June 24, 2010

Over the past three decades, the Reduced Shakespeare Company has built itself into a small entertainment industry, churning out crowd-pleasers that follow a high-concept, safe-bet formula. In its latest sally, the troupe is roundly mocking a bigger entertainment industry known for churning out crowd-pleasers that follow high-concept, safe-bet formulas. That's right: The minds behind "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged)," "The Complete History of America (abridged)" and other loopily condensed works have now concocted "Completely Hollywood (abridged)," a movie-theme spoof that, one evening this week, sent a Kennedy Center audience into regular peals of near-hysterical laughter.

Even a jaded critic who winces a little at the irony -- the commercially shrewd RSC (CDs and DVDs on sale outside the theater!) skewering commercially shrewd Tinseltown -- has to admit that "Completely Hollywood" is both witty and appealingly goofy. Premiered in 2005, but just now making its D.C. debut, the show consists of 90 minutes of skits and shtick lampooning or referring to 197 films (according to a numbered list in the program). Whether original cast members Reed Martin, Austin Tichenor and Dominic Conti are donning bonnets for "Darcy's Angels," a "Pride & Prejudice" action-flick spinoff ("It is a truth universally acknowledged that one of you has been kidnapped," a deep voice-over intones), or simply tossing out punning suggestions for sure-fire celluloid hits (how about a double-dose of epic: "Gandhi With the Wind?" Or a Robert De Niro-Jessica Tandy collaboration, "Taxi Driving Miss Daisy"?), the tone is one of gleeful absurdism.

The good-humored skewering (whose pace drags just a tad in the last 15 minutes) ranges over the decades. The actors go mute to send up silent movies (expect a mustachioed melodrama villain and Harold Lloyd-style slapstick). But they also burlesque the post-"Avatar" vogue for 3-D (no glasses needed: The performers merely wave flashlights around in a blackout and cry, "3-D!"). Some of the gags are funny because they use primitive means to evoke a high-tech art form: A doll dropped in a bucket stands in for a climactic stunt in "Darcy's Angels," for instance. In another droll moment, the gangly Conti -- who supplies much of the production's physical humor, including a slow-motion "Chariots of Fire" jog -- sticks his head in a cardboard frame to do a hilarious imitation of the roaring MGM lion.

But most of the humor riffs on movie studios' tendency to favor tried-and-true plotting and casting recipes. One of the show's inspired moments, for instance, conjures up a "Wizard of Oz"/"Star Wars" mash-up, with Dorothy (a be-wigged and be-frocked Martin) yellow-brick-roading along with Yoda (a puppet), instead of Toto, in her basket. Another zany sequence imagines a documentary-spaghetti western hybrid, with Al Gore (Tichenor) -- in full "Inconvenient Truth" mode -- as the sheriff.

These zingers seem particularly on-target in a summer that has brought us the likes of "Sex and the City 2." With certain previous RSC shows, one might be pardoned for having thought that the troupe would be exploiting culture for profit and silly yuks. "Completely Hollywood," whose myriad volleying allusions remind us just how deeply film lore has penetrated our collective consciousness, feels more like smart, timely satire.

The entrepreneurial aspect of the company's showbiz franchise is still in evidence, of course. After curtain call, the actors descend from the stage and race up the aisles of the Kennedy Center's Terrace Theater as the applause explodes. The moment carries overtones of Oscar winners striding up to receive their awards. In fact, Martin, Tichenor and Conti are making their way to the States Gallery, where they will autograph RSC merchandise.

From the Reduced Shakespeare Company, written and directed by Reed Martin and Austin Tichenor, with additional material by Dominic Conti. Sound design, Zach Moore; props, Liz Fitzpatrick, Jonathan Hall, Jennifer Harris, Kelly Hilterbrand, Gay Kahkonen and Chris Marcus; backdrop design, Dottie Marshall Englis.