Funny, stylish ‘Souvenir’ could pick up the pace

Even before the vicious age of Twitter and Facebook memes, America loved to laugh at celebrities. What was she wearing? What was he thinking? Always an ego boost to tear someone down, right?

In the case of Florence Foster Jenkins, though, America might have had a point. Jenkins was a socialite of the pre-World War II years who fancied herself an operatic singer — despite having no particular skill with pitch, tempo or intonation.

Stephen Temperley’s play “Souvenir,” onstage from the Bay Street Players in Eustis, tells her unlikely story. If her name sounds familiar, a 2016 biopic starring Meryl Streep, brought her back into the spotlight.

“Souvenir,” which had a brief Broadway run in 2005, is fashioned as a memory play. Loyal accompanist Cosme McMoon (Stephen Merritt) relates the incredible rise of Jenkins (Libby Sellers) to cultfigure status on the New York music scene.

The play is rather like a cross between Britcom “Keeping Up Appearances” — with Jenkins echoing Hyacinth Bouquet’s cluelessness about her own follies — and “Sunset Boulevard” — with McMoon as the struggling artist who latches onto a deluded diva as a meal ticket before developing an affection for her.

A primary difficulty with the play, though, is it relies heavily on two repeating jokes: Jenkins’ obliviousness to her lack of talent, and McMoon’s horrified reaction to her mangling of Mozart and others.

Sellers serenely does a fine job of seeming perfectly at ease as her voice makes its squawks and shrieks. It’s difficult to sing believably badly, which she does, but then lets us hear her actual singing voice, which provides for a lovely and sentimental climax to the piece.

Merritt is a whiz on the keys, though he could dig a little deeper in his character’s moments of introspection.

Jenkins’ aversion to critics comes up in the play. So with apologies, to be dreadful for a moment, the biggest flaw in the production is that it never quite crackles like it should.