Step into the world of hilarity and absurdity with our ultimate guide to farces! From theatre classics to new hits, these comedic masterpieces always delight audiences. Explore the timeless appeal of farces, uncovering the witty plots, unforgettable characters, and laughter-inducing situations that define this beloved genre.
Photo by Sara Krulwich/The New York Times, 2012 Broadway production
One Man, Two Guvnors by Richard Bean
Brighton, England. 1963. Change is in the air, and Francis Henshall is looking to make his mark. Fired from a skiffle band and in search of work, he finds himself employed by small-time gangster Roscoe Crabbe, in town to collect a fee from his fiancee’s gangster father. But Roscoe is really Rachel, posing as her own dead brother, herself in love with Stanley Stubbers (her brother’s killer) who, in turn, becomes our hero’s other ‘guvnor’. Fighting a mounting sense of confusion, Francis goes out of his way to serve both bosses. But with the distractions of a pneumatic bookkeeper, a self-important actor and select members of the criminal fraternity (not to mention his own mammoth appetite) to contend with, how long can he keep them apart?
Clue adapted from the screenplay by Jonathan Lynn, written by Sandy Rustin, additional material by Hunter Foster and Eric Price
Based on the iconic 1985 Paramount movie which was inspired by the classic Hasbro board game, Clue is a hilarious farce-meets-murder mystery. The tale begins at a remote mansion, where six mysterious guests assemble for an unusual dinner party where murder and blackmail are on the menu. When their host turns up dead, they all become suspects. Led by Wadsworth – the butler, Miss Scarlet, Professor Plum, Mrs. White, Mr. Green, Mrs. Peacock and Colonel Mustard race to find the killer as the body count stacks up. Clue is the comedy whodunit that will leave both cult-fans and newcomers in stitches as they try to figure out…WHO did it, WHERE, and with WHAT! This title is also available in a High School Edition.
The Play That Goes Wrong by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer & Henry Shields
From Mischief, Broadway masters of comedy, comes the smash hit farce. Welcome to opening night of the Cornley University Drama Society’s newest production, The Murder at Haversham Manor, where things are quickly going from bad to utterly disastrous. This 1920s whodunit has everything you never wanted in a show—an unconscious leading lady, a corpse that can’t play dead, and actors who trip over everything (including their lines). Nevertheless, the accident-prone thespians battle against all odds to make it through to their final curtain call, with hilarious consequences! Part Monty Python, part Sherlock Holmes, this Olivier Award–winning comedy is a global phenomenon that’s guaranteed to leave you aching with laughter! This title is also available in a High School Edition and One-Act Version.
Photo by Brett Boardman, 2016 Sydney Theatre Company production
A Flea in Her Ear by David Ives, a new version of Georges Feydeau’s farce
Raymonde Chandebise suspects that her husband, Victor, a placid and successful insurance executive, is secretly having an affair. To find out, she and her friend Lucienne write him an anonymous love letter suggesting a rendezvous at the shady Frisky Puss Hotel. Thinking the letter was intended for his coworker, the gigolo Tournel, Victor sends Tournel off to make the rendezvous in his place. Lucienne’s jealous Spanish husband, meanwhile, finds the letter, recognizes his wife’s handwriting and takes his pistols to the Frisky Puss, hoping to catch her in the act. Meanwhile, Victor’s nephew Camille tries to warn everyone about the mix-up, but his ridiculous speech impediment prevents anyone from understanding him. In Act Two, all decamp to the Frisky Puss where, it turns out, the drunken bellboy Poche is the exact double of the proper Victor Chandebise. Meeting Poche and thinking she’s been caught by her husband, Raymonde keeps trying to escape from the hotel with Tournel, but a revolving bed keeps flinging them from room to room, as more and more of the involved parties pile into the hotel in a climax culminating in the entrance of the jealous Spaniard and his pistols. In Act Three the vortex spins even faster as all the parties return to the Chandebise home utterly confused about what actually happened and who was who at the Frisky Puss. The drunken bellboy arrives, is mistaken once again for Victor, and all the threads of the multiple mix-ups are sorted out as Victor and Raymonde recognize their mutual confusions and are reunited.
Photo by Sara Krulwich/The New York Times, 2016 Off-Broadway production
The Servant of Two Masters by Carlo Goldoni, translated and adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher and Paolo Emilio Landi
A cross between traditional Italian commedia and postmodern vaudeville, this new version of Goldoni’s classic pits the madcap servant Truffaldino against masters, mistresses, lovers, lawyers, and twenty-seven plates of meatballs. Imagine a Bob Hope or Woody Allen comedy written by Monty Python and performed with the physical bravura of Chaplin or Keaton—with places in the script for ad-libs and audience participation.
Suite Surrender by Michael McKeever
It’s 1942, and two of Hollywood’s biggest divas have descended upon the luxurious Palm Beach Royale Hotel—assistants, luggage, and legendary feud with one another in tow. Everything seems to be in order for their wartime performance—that is, until they are somehow assigned to the same suite. Mistaken identities, overblown egos, double entendres, and a lap dog named Mr. Boodles round out this hilarious riot of a love note to the classic farces of the 30s and 40s.
Return of the Script by Don Zolidis
Miss Walters’s life is upended after she does the unthinkable and forgets to return a perusal script. Now, she’s on the run from international conglomerate Musical Theater Global, trying to dodge the two agents they sent after her. (Which is especially hard since one of them can talk to birds.) If Miss Walters wants to live one day more, she must find and return the perusal before MTG finds her. Return of the Script is a madcap chase by plane, train, and automobile that teaches an important lesson: Always read the terms and conditions.
Farce of Habit by Jones Hope Wooten
Comic fireworks explode in Farce of Habit, an absurdly funny Southern-fried romp that takes us back to the Reel ’Em Inn, the finest little fishing lodge in the Ozarks. The proprietor, D. Gene Wilburn, is looking forward to a peaceful weekend on the lake. But there are only two chances of that happening: slim and none. Why, for example, has his wife, Wanelle, picked these three days to white-knuckle her way through caffeine withdrawal? Why is his son Ty’s marriage to Jenna falling apart so fast? Could it have something to do with the French can-can costume Ty is wearing? How on earth would D. Gene’s feisty sister, Maxie, allow herself to get caught up in such a bizarre undercover police assignment? And that’s just his family. If this isn’t enough to thwart D. Gene’s weekend plans, he’s got a gaggle of nuns who’ve converged on the Inn, hell-bent on experiencing a nature retreat—which might be tolerable if D. Gene didn’t have a chronic fear of anything in a habit. Add to this the presence of Jock McNair, a nationally known relationship guru whose colossal ego threatens everyone’s sanity; a shy retiree anxious to cut loose and embrace his “inner caveman” and a couple of wild women who may or may not be who they claim to be. Throw in the storm of the century that’s fast bearing down on Mayhew, Arkansas, and D. Gene has no prayer of baiting a hook any time soon. Oh, and did we mention there’s an axe murderer on the loose? If you enjoy gloriously preposterous hilarity, then laughing your way through the take-no-prisoners lunacy of a Jones Hope Wooten comedy is one habit you’ll never want to break!
Fuddy Meers by David Lindsay-Abaire
Claire has a rare form of psychogenic amnesia that erases her memory whenever she goes to sleep. This morning, like all mornings, she wakes up a blank slate. Her chipper husband comes in with a cup of coffee, explains her condition, hands her a book filled with all sorts of essential information, and he disappears into the shower. A limping, lisping, half-blind, half-deaf man in a ski mask, pops out from under her bed and claims to be her brother, there to save her. Claire’s info book is quickly discarded, and she’s hustled off to the country-house of her mother, a recent stroke victim whose speech has been reduced to utter gibberish. Claire’s journey gets even more complicated when a dimwitted thug with a foul-mouthed hand puppet pops up at a window, and her driven husband and perpetually stoned son show up with a claustrophobic lady-cop that they’ve kidnapped. Every twist and turn in this funhouse plot bring Claire closer to revealing her past life and everything she thought she’d forgotten. It’s one harrowing and hilarious turn after another on this roller coaster ride through the day of an amnesiac trying to decipher her fractured life. This poignant and brutal new comedy traces one woman’s attempt to regain her memory while surrounded by a curio-cabinet of alarmingly bizarre characters.
