REVIEW Well hung doors and actors create an outrageous farce

Well Hung by Robert Lord and rescripted by Stephen Sinclair
Auckland Theatre Company
Maidment Theatre
Until March 5

Police stations are not normally the location for used car deals, illegal medical procedures and illicit affairs – but then again maybe they are.

In Robert Lord's small town New Zealand these seem to be standard occurrences involving Sergeant Bert Donelly (Simon Ferry) and Constable Trev Brown (Pua Magasiva).

Their police station is in the middle of a big double murder inquiry (closely resembling the Crewe murders) and while they know who did it – Wally the local town dimwit – there are a few other suspects.

Of more immediate importance is Trev’s attempts to sell his clapped out car and secure an abortion for his girlfriend.

The biggest impediment to solving the crime, however, is defective Detective Jaspar Sharp (Carl Bland), a city cop who appears to have been to the Monty Python school of detecting.

The opening minutes of the play look as though we are at an amateur production of a camped up version of a modernised Victorian melodrama with overblown thespianic posturing, but this is merely one of director Ben Crowder's clever ways of reworking the play.

The seven characters we encounter blunder there way through the play, which Crowder has imbued with all the hallmarks of farce as they reveal their various grubby secrets and peccadilloes.

As with all farces you need lots of doors and Well Hung has six or seven of them, a couple of them even have starring roles.

A lot of the time the play veers into slap stick although there are no banana skins. But there are a number of other objects to trip over or slide on, including a discarded pair of policemen’s trousers.

The remarkable physicality of the acting of Carl Bland and Pua Magasiva are nicely balanced by the solid plodding of Simon Ferry. Adam Gardiner as Wally and the wacky Adam provides some great character turns while Dena Kennedy as Lynette and Hortensia gives a couple of stylish performances.

Within all the comedy, farce and slapstick are a few social and political issues such as the planting of evidence at crime scenes and procuring abortions but these hardly get noticed as the audience is laughing so much.