Play Review - Noises off

Play Review of "Noises Off"

The play "Noises Off," as performed by the Indiana University Southeast Theatre Department is an improbable, ridiculously hilarious performance. It is the story of a small cast of actors, and their struggles to not only get the acting right for their play, "Nothing On," but to also keep their personal relationships off stage, something many of them did have troubles doing. It incorporates implied humor as well as 'out in the open' comedy, which has the audience leaving after the show feeling fully satisfied.

The script was very well written, however it was the performance of the actors, as well as the good lighting and scenery that brought the play together. For the most part, the actors worked together throughout the performance to produce a hilarious chaos that kept the audience entertained and amused, although some of the actors seemed to portray different degrees of the British accent. Also, the points of interest on stage varied quickly, and often without warning, which kept the audience from becoming bored with one character or another.

The costumes that the actors wore fit into the characters very well for the situations. For example, the burglar, or burglars in some cases, wore a black shirt and slacks, with a green scarf and a mask, looking both realistic, yet in some senses, simply comical, which fit the character, both in "Noises Off" and "Nothing On" very well. The lighting in the play stayed fairly constant; dimming only and the ends of acts and brightening at intermission. This relied on the actors to shift the audience's attention to where it needed to be for certain important action happening on stage.

Most all of the noises portrayed in the production were made by the actors themselves. However, the audience was put through a test when the entire stage was turned around, and they were able to see what the actors were doing back stage. At the same time on the other side, actors not on front stage were performing "Nothing On." This part of the play was somewhat hard to follow, but if you could follow it, it made the play much funnier, and added to the aspect of the play within a play, as actors performing "Nothing On" interacted with actors backstage to create that chaotic hilarity.

While the two plays were