A hilarious catastrophe for Christmas

Christmas -- that time of year when fellowship and joy prevail worldwide -- takes a somewhat different course in Bernard Farrell’s outrageously funny new comedy, “Many Happy Returns.”

In this, the fourth of Farrell’s plays to receive its American premiere at the Laguna Playhouse, a planned holiday celebration, coupled with a potential career move upward, turns into hilarious disaster.

Andrew Barnicle, the playhouse’s artistic director who also helmed the first three Farrell premieres in Laguna, has mounted a fresh, brutally farcical take on the holiday season. The six characters are true originals, thrust by Farrell’s fertile imagination into the most outlandish of situations.

It begins innocently enough. Irene (Susan Duerden) and her husband Arthur (Barry Lynch) are preparing an elaborate yuletide celebration for guests Declan (Brendan Ford) and his wife Amanda (Melanie Lora). Seems that Declan once was a local nobody who now owns a chain of three department stores in New Zealand -- thanks to Arthur’s motivational coaching -- and now the hosts are looking to cash in.

Irene and Arthur have fallen on hard times -- he’s lost his job after coming unglued at a swimming pool, and she’s reduced to washing dogs for a living. They live with her father Matty (Nick Ullett), an elderly snoop whose wife Gladys (Robin Pearson Rose) has been “seeing the world” for the last year or so and picks the most inopportune moment to drop in for a visit.

Chaos ensues when the couples decide to go skinny-dipping in their new (borrowed) hot tub. Only one gets down, briefly, to the bare essentials, which makes for a rollicking first-act finale.

Lynch, seemingly a bit long in the tooth for this assignment, performs magnificently, particularly when his down-the-chimney appearance as Santa Claus goes hilariously awry. Duerden functions beautifully as the organizer and eternal optimist of the elaborate scheme.

The dynamic young executive played by Ford is a bit stereotypical, but Ford puts his own authoritative stamp on the role, reveling in his recently acquired power, and excels in his ultimate meltdown scene. Lora’s supremely sexy Amanda (“call me Mandy”) is a delicious piece of new-age eye-candy with, however improbably, an eye for her host.

The constantly eavesdropping Ullett, a near-ringer in appearance and acting style for Ed Wynn, keeps the comedic pot boiling with his sage yet caustic comments. And Rose splendidly douses the holiday spirit, particularly for Ulletta’s character.

Farrell’s riotous shenanigans are played out against a magnificent backdrop designed by Dwight Richard Odle, a farmhouse near Dublin with a necessarily huge chimney. Julie Keen’s costumes and Paulie Jenkins’ lighting enhance the production considerably.

You’ll want to return to “Many Happy Returns” to catch the lines you missed while laughing aloud. It’s one of the funniest shows of the holiday season or any other time of year.

IF YOU GO:

*WHAT: “Many Happy Returns”

*WHERE: Laguna Playhouse, 606 Laguna Canyon Road

*WHEN: Tuesdays through Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 2 and 8, Sundays at 2 until Dec. 18

*COST: $20 to $59

*CALL: (949) 497-278720051125h3hei2kf(LA)Melanie Lora and Barry Lynch star in “Many Happy Returns.” 20051125iqffu2kn(LA)Melanie Lora and Barry Lynch star in “Many Happy Returns.”