A jolly nun for Christmas

It’s Christmas in Laguna Beach and this means it’s time again for that very funny nun to take the stage at Laguna Playhouse. And as always, audience members are part of the script.

This year, playwright and performer Maripat Donovan explores her CSI side by staging a reenactment of the Nativity, with the help of her sometimes-reluctant but ever-game “students” — audience members who were informed they would earn a coveted Papal Indulgence by participating.

A Papal Indulgence gives you a “pass” if you are on your way to the lower regions and sends you instead to heaven, according to Donovan. An offer not to be refused, indeed!

It’s all very funny stuff.

Donovan is an award-winning actor, but improv seems to be her forte.

With “The Mystery of the Magi’s Gold,” Sister has her work cut out for her in solving a 2,000-year-old “cold case” — what happened to the gold the Three Wise Men brought to the Baby Jesus?

The frankincense and myrrh have been accounted for, but the gold — which could have been used to upgrade the Holy Family’s accommodations from a manger to a suite, after all — was either lost in transit or swiped.

Sister employs her prodigious powers of crime-scene analysis to reveal the thief through determining motive, opportunity and proximity, much as Hercule Poirot might have done.

Along the way, we learn some arcane facts about Catholic theology; or rather, we are made to feel embarrassingly ignorant until someone comes up with the answer to such questions as: “Who staged the very first live Nativity scene?” (Study up on this and you’ll win a prize, like the person in our audience who impressed many by shouting out the correct answer.)

Monday night’s audience included quite a few former Catholic school students, and others, who quickly learned that the correct way to address the nun-in-charge was with a sprightly “Yes, Sister,” “No, Sister,” or “My name is Maureen, Sister.”

Donovan’s humorous take on a Catholic education has been bringing audiences back since 1993 when she staged her first “Late Night Catechism,” followed by “Late Night Catechism 2,” both of which have been staples at the Playhouse during the holidays.

Even if you do not normally quake in your shoes at the sight of a nun in front of a blackboard, you will as Donovan pelts the audience with exhortations, quizzes and insults designed to whip you into shape.

And it’s all done with love for the nuns who toil to cram knowledge into the heads of distracted students. Donovan has raised about $2 million to help care for retired Catholic nuns who have no other source of income after they leave their lifetime vocations — at very advanced ages.

More Donovan humor is in store for Laguna: the world premiere of her new one-woman show, “’Till Death Do Us Part: Late Night Catechism 3,” will open at the Playhouse March 31 and run until May 3.

As Donovan told us with a mischievous grin, “I’ve finally wiggled my way into the regular season.”

IF YOU GO

WHAT: “Sister’s Christmas Catechism: The Mystery of the Magi’s Gold”

WHERE: Laguna Playhouse, 606 Laguna Canyon Road

WHEN: 7:30 nightly through Wednesday; 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

COST: $40 to $55

FOR TICKETS: Call (949) 497-2784, ext. 1; www.lagunaplayhouse.com or visit the box office.