Things I hate about theater: cheesy melodrama, foppish buffoons, harlequins, pantomime, slapstick, "pantaloons," stylized posing and posturing, desperate reaches to squeeze pathetic homosexual innuendoes from text that does not support them (that REALLY makes my teeth itch), and hole-filled plots that are based upon needless misunderstandings and improbable deceit (à la "Oh, NO! Mr. Roper can't find out that Chrissy hid the rent check in Janet's birthday cake! Quick, Jack! Pretend you're a toaster oven!"). Then there are the things I really hate about theater: the modernization and/or adaptation of classical works, junking them all up with affected modern scenarios, and pop culture references and colloquialisms that create nonsensical, anachronistic train wrecks. To a greater or lesser degree, Intiman's production of A Servant of Two Masters contained every one of these despicable elements--sins that I have mercilessly vilified other theater companies for committing.

So why did I love it so darn much?

We reviewers are prone to great exaggeration. So I will restrain myself, best as I can, from confining my review to an exhaustive list of very "reviewer-esque" clichés: The best comedy of the season! Brilliant! A theatrical triumph! This is what we go to the theater for! A whimsical romp! (I wouldn't know a "whimsical romp" if it was whimsically romping on my forehead.) But every one of these exaggerated stock clichés is true--and then some.

Here's the gist of it: Truffaldino is a manservant in 18th-century Venice. Through a set of bizarre coincidences (and because he's a greedy pig), he comes to work for two masters simultaneously (a stock Roman/Italian theme). First he works for Beatrice, a woman who has disguised herself as her dead brother Rasponi, so she can track down her lover Florindo, the man who killed him. Then Truffaldino meets up with Florindo and decides to work for him too. The plot is complicated by the fact that a young woman named Clarice was betrothed to (the now dead) Rasponi by her father (are you following this?). But upon news of Rasponi's death, Clarice is free to marry the man she really loves, Silvio. However, when Beatrice--disguised as Rasponi (Quick Jack! Into the toaster oven!)--arrives to claim the money from the dowry, well, the whole scenario is just pregnant with the possibility of disaster.

Theater aficionados will agree that we've all seen unspeakable wrongs visited upon the works of the classicists. When faced with a bit of Molière, Goldoni, or Shakespeare, most directors either (A) play it straight--archaic themes and language firmly intact--which usually alienates the audience or simply bores them to death, or (B) egotistically "update" the piece, which degrades the integrity of the work and inevitably destroys it. Neither is pretty. However, director Bartlett Sher has shown that with a few small, clever innovations and the blessing of a rock-solid cast, classical theater can not only be accessible and entertaining--it can be downright fantastic.

Sher was brilliant in his simplicity: He made the backstage area part of the set, lit the mainstage with candles, and positioned a line caller, in full costume, unobtrusively on stage right. When actors completed a scene, they would retire to this faux backstage area, which was also set in 18th-century Venice (are you following this?). Unobtrusively adding this new dimension (actors playing actors playing characters--without altering one word of the original text, mind you) left the cast free to own the silliness and pomp of their characters, and to fully indulge in the play's absurdity. All of the aforementioned pitfalls of producing a classic were avoided. The cast was having such a wonderful time! Thusly, so was I--and the gratuitous ad-libs about ganja pipes and community colleges (that would normally have my eyes rolling and my poison pen scribbling) were pulled off masterfully, adding and enriching rather than distracting.

There isn't enough room to give the cast the adulation they deserve. Elisabeth Adwin, Frank Corrado, Jason Cottle, Patti Cohenour, Dan Donohue, Jane Jones, Laurence Ballard, Jeff Steitzer, R. Hamilton Wright... Intiman brought out the big guns on this one. And it paid off: The level of artistry was extraordinary. Not only do I wholeheartedly recommend Servant, I can guarantee that I'll be treating myself to it again, very, very soon.