DEAL WITH THE DEVIL A WINNING MIX OF WIT, PHYSICAL COMEDY
Alberta Theatre Projects' production of W.O. Mitchell's The Black Bonspiel of Wullie Maccrimmon is a sinfully funny guilty pleasure.
It's 90 minutes of good, old-fashioned theatrical nonsense conjured by a writer who was as sly and witty as he was literate. The jokes and puns may be obvious, but they rarely fail to hit their marks. The hometown characters Mitchell created 73 years ago are still as identifiable as ever because they are so wonderfully real and lovable.
Black Bonspiel is Mitchell's riff on the Faust legend which sees a man exchange his soul for the unattainable thing most dear to him. The original Faust bartered his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures. For the humble cobbler in the Prairie town of Wild Rose in 1936, it's the chance to skip the winning team in the Macdonald Brier.
When Wullie (Kevin Corey) muses he'd give anything to take home the top prize in the prestigious Brier, the Devil (Natasha Girgis) is only too happy to oblige, if he'll just sign away his soul. Mitchell's clever twist is that Wullie makes the Devil a counter-offer. He'll forfeit his soul if the Devil can beat Wullie in a curling match, setting up a second act that comes remarkably close to a Looney Toons cartoon.
It takes an actor as confident as Corey to make Wullie the straight man in his own play, allowing everyone who enters his shop to be gleefully eccentric. In Corey's hands, he's a crafty old Scott who can handle the town busybody Annie Brown (Valerie Planche), or the local reverend (Trevor Rueger) with as much skill and dexterity as he does the Devil. Planche makes Annie a comic force to be reckoned with, both vocally and physically.
As the ruler of Hell and collector of souls, Girgis is devilishly good. There are times she moves like the slippery serpent who stalked the Garden of Eden, and at other times she's all businesslike in fine bargaining mode. Girgis is an excellent physical comedian, especially during the second-act curling match when things begin going wrong for her team.
Wullie's teammates, Clock Shirley Brown (Kira Bradley), Pipe-fitting Charlie Brown (Sheldon Elter) and Malleable Charlie Brown (David Trimble) have some of their best moments when trying to wrap their heads around just who they're competing against.
The Devil's team consists of Judas Iscariot (David Sklar), Lizzie Borden (Emily Howard) and Macbeth (David Haysom) and they are the scene stealers Mitchell intended them to be.
Lizzie can hardly wait to whack someone with her axe-handled broom. Costume designer Caroline Broadley has given her a great blood-soaked dress, and Howard gives her a sense of wildeyed enthusiasm that borders on mania.
Sklar's Judas has silver coins, and he kisses his opponent Clock Shirley Brown to register some Biblical references, and there is something creepy and reptilian about his movements and tongue.
It is to Haysom's inestimable credit that, when there are so many great character actors on stage, he is able to hit a home run every time he speaks, and with all of his winning physical shtick. His Macbeth is a joy to behold.
Scott Reid's sets (cobbler shop and a curling rink) and props give the actors a wonderful playground to have their fun in, and director Christian Goutsis's inspired touches are everywhere. Broadley's costumes, whether they're for the hell hounds or the townsfolk, immediately establish character, and Narda Mccarroll's lighting tricks and Andrea Wettstein's sound design remind us a great deal of care and talent has gone into polishing Mitchell's play into this little gem that runs in the Martha Cohen Theatre until March 10.