'Artifice' at Harlequins is hilarious

SANDUSKY — An excellent play, a great venue, a skilled director and a wonderful cast. Those are the ingredients needed to produce a successful community theater play.Harlequins put all of them together and has succeeded — splendidly — with "Artifice," a sophisticated comedy that traps eight delightful characters inside a home somewhere in New York.The play, written by Ohio native Anne Flanagan, is part farce, part mystery, part suspense, that leaves the audience laughing out loud but worried someone might get killed.It opens at 8 p.m. today and runs through the end of February at Harlequins Sandusky Community Theatre, 414 Wayne St., in Sandusky. Adam Cox plays artist Payne Showers, who returns from the dead hoping to rekindle his romance with Maggie, just as his artwork is about to sell for a fortune to pay off the debts he left for his estranged widow, Maggie La Rue, played by Kate Volz as a woman who must make decisions about love, life and finances. Troy Moore plays Trent Matlock, a superficial person who is an actor by trade, and Maggie's boyfriend since after Payne disappeared under an avalanche somewhere halfway across the world. The cast of "Artifice," from left to right: Mary Malerich as Emma; Veronica Vandexbout as Judith Fontaine; Troy Moore as Trent Matlock; Adam Cox plays artist Payne Showers; Kate Volz as Maggie La Rue; Mark Sartor as Richard; Morgan Pfeiffer plays Graciela; and Jim Brokow as Fitzgerald. Socked in by a snowstorm that prevents anyone from leaving, the cast, which includes Mark Sartor as Richard, Payne's best friend, and Maggie, are about to sell Payne's art collection to Mick Fitzgerald at a private viewing at Maggie's home. Fitzgerald, the customer who pays a fortune for the dead artist's work, is a strongman and alleged mobster played believably by Jim Brokow. He taunts Richard — sometimes intentionally, sometimes not intentionally — to a nervousness that's hilarious.Morgan Pfeiffer plays Graciela, a last-minute substitute for a bartender who failed to show up for the art show, and she's delightfully precise in the role, playing it naive, superstitious and sexy. Rounding out the cast are Veronica Vandenbout, as Judith Fontaine, owner of a newspaper that publicizes the art sale, and Mary Malerich as Emma, a woman posing as an art critic.Directed by Cody Noon, the cast swims through this play like synchronized swimmers, capturing the audience's attention with humor and belly laughs. "Artifice" opens this evening at 8 p.m. with shows on Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. It's also playing at 8 p.m. Feb. 23 and Feb. 24, and it closes on Sunday, Feb. 25 with a performance at 2 p.m. Tickets are $15 at the door or can be bought at the website, harlequinstheatre.org. Saturday's performance is almost sold out so check at the theater's website. Adam Cox as Payne Showers and Kate Volz as his 'estranged' widow, Maggie La Rue.