We've seen two Noises Off productions at San Francisco Playhouse, eight years apart, the first with Susi Damilano directing and the current version helmed by Bill English. This 2025 production has a first act that moves a little slower, followed by a second act that never stops firing in all directions. Michael Frayn's 1982 West End love letter to acting and theater production, in which every action has an unequal. unexpected and outlandish reaction, retains all of its slapstick humor and frenetic pace.
Everyone in the fictional story is sleeping with someone else in the cast. Director Lloyd (Patrick Russell) is trying to get flowers to his current fling, Brooke (Sophia Alawi), but his penultimate sweetheart Poppy (Vivienne Truong) has a small problem which will keep getting larger for several more months. Frederick (Nima Rakhshanifar) has issues with just about everything that cause him nosebleeds at inconvenient moments. Selsdon (played to perfection by Louis Parnell) has his eye on the whiskey bottle at at all times. The cast is trying to perform on stage while chaos reins backstage (which we see at the brilliant beginning to Act 2).
A special shout out for the fake program on the back of the real program, in which we discover that the fictional play thanks Kumfy Restraints Ltd. for the straitjackets.
I mean, Kumfy Restraints. That earns a Bangle of Praise all by itself.
RATINGS ★★★ BANG
The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division grants Three Stars and a Bangle of Praise to San Francisco Playhouse's production of "Noises Off." Lots of laughs and a barrelful of crazy.
"Noises Off"
San Francisco Playhouse
450 Post St. (2d floor of Kensington Park Hotel)
Through Nov. 8, 2025
$52-$145
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