‘Risque Pairs’ opens Pines Players’ season
By Don Klein

If you are fortunate enough to see the new comedy "Risqué Pairs," now being performed by the Ocean Pines Players, you should be warned of these facts. It is a brand new comedy review enjoying its world premiere right here in Berlin. It is an adaptation of a book by Ken Friedman containing nearly three dozen unrelated comedy scenes. And most importantly, it is good fun for everyone involved. 

The cast of 12 exceptionally funny community actors who were recruited by director "Jack" Graham Caldwell for this unique presentation seemed to be having as much fun doing the scenes as the audience observing the rapid-fire sequences of stage shenanigans.

How could you not be entertained by the knowledge that the ageless Barbie and Ken, played with doll-like inflexibility by Mr. Caldwell and Em Hench, are totally bored with each other after 40 years of a stifling relationship? They want to start a family, but alas, how is that possible when everything about them is plastic including their genitalia? But there are lots more, they just kick-off the show.

The most hysterical scenes are those featuring Linda Hilte, one of the most talented members of the Pines troupe. Miss Hilte brings down the house portraying a struggling actress-model who has been trying unsuccessfully for years to break into show business only to learn that her mother and father won lucrative jobs in modeling and acting without even trying. In frustration she stabs a lemon with the ferocity of Jack the Ripper. The sinister glare in her eyes tells you she wished the target was her mother not the lemon.

In a scene with Sharon Sorrentino, playing her blasé parent who does not recognize the envy her casual success is causing her covetous daughter, Ms. Hilte demonstrates comedic skills that bring the house down. How Miss Sorrentino manages to keep a straight face through all of her clowning daughter's pleading and gyrations is worthy of an award in itself.

Miss Hilte shows up in another skit, this time playing a juiced up, self-indulgent caged parrot who gets her comeuppance from her slick mistress, played by Miss Hench. Not to be undone, is a pair of flies in another skit, flitting around an abandoned picnic table dining on a half-eaten corncob. The insects are played cleverly by Caitlin McKimmie and Matt Emerick.

One of the best lines comes in a mother-daughter sequence featuring Fran Mancino and Amy Stephan. The daughter reminds her mother of all the trades she tried to master in her unfulfilled life, including taxidermy. The mother replies, "Taxidermy? And you, a vegetarian."  

"Risqué Pairs" is a conglomeration of twelve skits collected and dramatized by Mr. Caldwell which were molded into a fascinating evening's entertainment. It all started when Mr. Caldwell came across the Friedman book, "35 for Two," while browsing for material in a New York bookstore last year.  The skits have the flavor of traditional vaudeville acts of generations ago, and they remind us why that kind of showmanship was so popular at one time in the nation's past. There are plenty of belly laughs, and there is no harm in that.  

Miss Sorrentino does a memorable scene with Bill Outten, playing a married couple with an out of control television remote which only seems to work on her, not their television set. How many husbands would love to own a remote with which to mute his wife at will? If the consequences were as funny as this sequence it would be well worth a visit to Radio Shack to see if there is one available.

Another sidesplitter is the sequence in which Fran Mancino plays a troubled patient in to visit her doctor, played by a most able straight man Charles Sorrentino. Seems her ailment is she suddenly gets the urge to tell jokes, a la Johnny Carson's opening dialogue in long past late night shows. The jokes are corny one-liners that Henry Youngman would have loved, but Miss Mancino's delivery is so well-paced, along with her puckish Zero Mostel mugging, you cannot help but get caught up in the frolicking.

Other members of the cast who performed various skits making the evening as entertaining as you are likely to find in this community, included Jerry Elmer and Chris Bosies.  Judy Nelson is the play's assistant director.

"Risqué Pairs" opened last week and will be performed at 8 p.m. this Thursday, Friday and Saturday, November 16, 17 and 18 at the theater of Most Blessed Sacrament Catholic School on Racetrack and Beauchamp Roads.