STAGE REVIEWS : ‘NOT BY BED ALONE’

With its sumptuous sets, impeccable costumes and attractive cast, UC Irvine’s “Not by Bed Alone” looks great. It has energy, too--the actors dash about tirelessly, trying gamely to create comic momentum.

But the stylish appearance and pitched performances don’t really add up to much. Director Dudley Knight’s treatment of this 1894 Georges Feydeau farce about infidelity and romantic strife leaves it resembling a glossy TV sitcom--full of pretty silliness that wears thin after 15 or 20 minutes.

“Not by Bed Alone” is typical Feydeau, meaning its humor is not very ambitious. Feydeau’s idea of comedy was to place haute couture types in uncomfortable situations, then bury them in vaudevillian gags. It is often coarse stuff. One of the running jokes here, for instance, is a character’s bad breath, which inspires a string of increasingly repugnant associations.

Knight apparently relishes the cruder elements of the play, as they are given the most attention. The boffo belly laughs are overdone, squelching any subtlety in the satire of French high society lurking between the lines.

The better performances come from Ron Hastings playing the slippery Bois d’Enghien, a handsome social climber trying to hide his mistress from his fiancee (this is the main thread of the skimpy plot); Mary Workman as his blithe bride-to-be, and Otto Joseph Coelho as a swaggering, amorous South American general in town for the party season.

They all parade through William T. Eigenbrodt’s elegant interiors, which lushly evoke the indulgence of the upper-upper class. Richard Triplett’s costumes are the perfect draping for folks who wear their money on their sleeves.

NOT BY BED ALONE A UC Irvine production of Georges Feydeau’s play. Director: Dudley Knight. With Judy Young, Steven Weddle, Alisa Hayashida, Jim Donovan, Lydia Murry, Ron Hastings, Larry Biederman, Lori Thimsen, Steven Ingrassia, Otto Joseph Coelho, Robert Kushell, Mary Workman, Laura Lawson, Nicholas Dierman and Tom Wuthrich. Scenery by William T. Eigenbrodt. Costumes: Richard Triplett. Lighting: Beverly Thies. Sound: Cory Clark. Plays today and Saturday at 8 p.m. at the Fine Arts Village Theatre on campus. Tickets $7.50. Information: (714) 856-5000.