New comedies find laughs in the world of theater

The key to an evening's entertainment at the theater this season is a reversal of Shakespeare's line, "All the world's a stage."

For the creators of three comedies that opened on Broadway earlier this month - "By Jeeves," a revival of "Noises Off," and Neil Simon's new play, "45 Seconds From Broadway" - the stage is indeed the world.

By Jeeves is a musical based on a British literary import, the stories of P.G. Wodehouse. The author's tales brought to life the upper-class, dumb-cluck Bertie Wooster, and his manservant, Jeeves, who watches over his master like St. George - the patron saint of England - all rolled together with Mary Poppins. But, in the hands of playwright and director Alan Ayckbourn, who wrote the book and lyrics and staged the work, and Andrew Lloyd Webber, composer of the score and musical arrangements, "By Jeeves" comes across as strangely low key - but not without its charms.

No doubt, Webber was determined to prove that he could write a nearly bare-stage musical that didn't depend on falling chandeliers, two-legged warbling felines, or humans on roller skates pretending they were trains.

Ayckbourn admits to freely inventing the plot, but basing it on the tone of the Wodehouse humor. In "By Jeeves," Bertie has become an actor, putting on a one-man show in the local church hall to raise money on behalf of the steeple fund. Being Wodehouse's Bertie, he's as vain as he is simple, and delighted to have the spotlight to himself as solo singer, banjo player, and arranger of the songs. Before the curtain goes up, some of his friends - Honoria Glossop, Bingo Little, Gussie Fink-Nottle, and the others - pass out programs to the patrons filing into their seats, as if they were back in a never-never vision of the English countryside sometime between the world wars.

The complications pile up when Bertie's banjo is lost in transit. Under the watchful gaze of Jeeves, the only stage manager in theater history with a stiff upper lip, Bertie is left to entertain the audience by improvising a complicated story about a weekend of misplaced identities, cross purposes, and clandestine romances.

The action is alternately silly and sweet, not to mention landing a poke or two at amateur theatricals the world over. There's no other word but impeccable for the cast, particularly John Scherer as Bertie, who proves himself expert in wrinkling his brow in amazement, followed by a "Eureka, I've got it!" expression.

British actor Martin Jarvis endows with a twinkle in his eye. Webber has written a score filled with quotes from his earlier works and those of other composers, but there are some bright numbers, particularly "By Jeeves" and the inspired visual gag of the finale.

Michael Frayn's Noises Off, which premièred in 1983, is also set in merry old England, on a theatrical circuit that is as far from London's West End, the equivalent of Broadway, as actors can travel. The premise revolves around a tour by a second-rate troupe performing one of those beloved off-color British farces that come with lots of slamming doors and compromising situations. The rambunctious props include four plates of sardines, which come and go as if Murphy's Law - "Whatever can happen, will" - were directing the traffic.

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