If time flies when you’re having fun, then it’s no wonder that the three-week run of Whose Wives Are They Anyway? has flown by so fast. I have thoroughly enjoyed being in this show. Every night is a new opportunity to make people laugh. We even get a few titters with the pre-show announcement that warns patrons to “Have fun … or else.” Once the characters are introduced and the plot is set, the audience is quickly engaged in the action. The laughter builds slowly as the seemingly straight-laced characters begin to lose their inhibitions and engage in increasingly outrageous behavior. We get some chuckles and giggles at first. By the time “Mrs. McGachen” – played by Geoff Wehner – is revealed, the snickers and snorts have turned into hoots, chortles and cackles. The audience loosens up as the characters lose their decorum. Before long, the sustained laughter swells throughout the theater, and as actors, we have to hold … and hold … and hold some more until the laughter finally ebbs enough to say our next lines.
Some of my best laughs are induced by my reactions or “takes” to what other characters are saying or doing. My character Wilson, a cantankerous old handyman, is often in the wrong place at just the right time to witness many of the shenanigans. My signature line is “I don’t believe it!” which I say – or silently mouth – no less than 18 times. Getting the biggest laugh often depends on split-second timing. Comedy is like fly fishing: You have to start with a good lure, garner attention through movement, land your line at the perfect time, and punch the right word to set the hook. Then you can reel them in. Once the feeding frenzy begins, the laughter builds and become contagious, and the audience swallows the jokes “hook, line and sinker” and keep on laughing till it hurts. After the show, a number of patrons have said to me “My face hurts from laughing so much!” That kind of laughter is certainly music to my ears.
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