Review: A hilarious 'Rumors' at Bristol Riverside Theatre

Here's a bit of gossip that will undoubtedly prove true: Bristol Riverside Theatre's production of Neil Simon's Rumors provides two hours of unashamedly hilarious entertainment.

Simon wrote Rumors in the late 1980s as a farce about the upper class in the style of Moliere. When lawyers Chris (Valerie Leonard) and Ken Gorman (Danny Vaccaro) arrive at the home of New York City's deputy mayor to celebrate his 10th wedding anniversary, they hear a gunshot.

Rushing upstairs, they find the host wounded, and the hostess missing. Was it suicide? A marital spat that turned violent? As a lawyer, Ken first thinks to protect the deputy mayor from scandal, but as the other guests arrive, a circle of lies spreads among them, each new partygoer hears a slightly different tale, and as the threat of the police arriving looms, they all begin to turn on one another in a catty, hysterical fashion.

Keith Baker's nimble direction modulates the humor and pace as Simon's script steers from a serious situation marked by quips ("who decorates in white") to one outrageous (aided by fantastic physical comedy) before finally escalating into a ridiculous culmination.

Between them, Vaccaro, Leonard C. Haas and Eleanor Handley (as Lenny and Claire Ganz) contribute the bulk of Simon's clever comedy. Vaccaro turns his once-sensible lawyer into a running gag that doesn't get stale for all of Act 2, Handley morphs from a nosy scandalmonger to vicious shrew, and Haas delivers a sensational performance as a beleaguered accountant that cements the plot in a whirlwind of a monologue.

Jason Simms' mammoth triangular set impresses even if Simon's farce doesn't rely on the trope of using multiple doors for quick changes and an accelerated coming and going of characters. Linda B. Stockton's costumes dress the cast in stylish gowns and formal wear that nicely accentuate a running gag of upper-crust charity.

Some dated references to Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev and the Concorde jet might throw off younger viewers (of which there were few this past Saturday night), but don't otherwise put a dent in the hilarity. If any social message peeks through, it's the tragedy that as a married couple endures, their circle of friends fills more with self-interested business associates and clients, rather than genuine well-wishers and companions.

Otherwise, little but laughter results from this sure-footed production. If you happen to find yourself in Bristol, Rumors will provide the perfect after-dinner treat to give you a bellyful of laughter.