The world at large seemed to reflect the chaos we’d just left at the end of The Old Globe’s production of Gordon Greenberg and Steve Rosen’s “Crime and Punishment, a Comedy” when we crossed the bridge to our cars at the end of the show.
A beautiful crescent moon that we saw as we started across suddenly disappeared about halfway, and try as we would (and did) to see it again, it never reappeared. I think Dostoevsky would have approved.
The audience certainly approved of the wild and crazy production it had just seen: a 90-minute morality tale performed by five outrageously talented actors playing more than 50 zany characters, riffing on the famous 19th-century masterpiece involving Raskolnikov, an impoverished student who becomes a murderer in order to save his family. No, it’s not the story you read in high school, it’s much crazier and a delight for the eyes if not the memory.
You recall, it’s about the student I’ll call Rasky, who has just completed the course work for his law degree but has not received his diploma just yet. He is anxious to get it, partly because Mom is so, so proud but mainly because the family really needs the money Rasky will now be able to make. Meanwhile, the landlord is yelling for the rent and threatening eviction.
The problem is, how to get his hands on the diploma. When Rasky goes to the university’s bursar to ask, he’s told that he has a long-overdue library book that he’ll have to pay the fine on before he gets it. But of course, he doesn’t have the money. How to get the bursar to release that piece of paper?
Rasky also has a sister named Dunya (played by Juliet Brett), who likes to read Pushkin and feels the need to find (what else?) a husband, in order to take at least some of the pressure of supporting the family off Rasky.
While Rasky is trying to get the bursar to release his diploma so he can get a job, he bumps into the female owner of a bar named Sonya (played by Stephanie Gibson) and is quite infatuated with her. Could this develop into something?
In the course of his efforts, political ideas are floated, Rasky considers donating a kidney to a sick orphan and Rudy Giuliani turns up as a journalist. And of course, the local police will show up.
I told you it was wild and crazy.
It’s not just the goofy story, it’s the presentation that’ll have you giggling. Wilson Chin’s set design uses stairways and set-level exits for entrances and exits, even the top of one stairway for the appearance of a spirit-like figure. Alejo Vietti’s costumes are a stitch (sorry), especially for the men when they’re switching sexes instantaneously. The women are luckier; they almost always get to look like women.
Amanda Zieve’s lighting and Lindsay Jones’ sound designs add to the atmosphere as well.
But it’s the script that will have you guffawing. Greenberg and Rosen will be remembered by local audiences as the authors of a show done here annually at the Globe: “Ebenezer Scrooge’s BIG San Diego Christmas Show.” This show has the same sensibility.
This show is a comic gem. Don’t miss it.
The details
“Crime and Punishment, a Comedy” plays through August 20, 2023 at The Old Globe Theatre, 1363 Old Globe Way in Balboa Park.
Shows Tuesday and Wednesday at 7 p.m.; Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m.; Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m.; Sunday at 2 and 7 p.m.
Tickets: (619) 234-5623
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