Since Todd Warfield arrived at the Alleyway Theatre, sojourns into the high camp realm of Reefer Madness or into the Halloween hell house have become more frequent. This week, Alleyway presents the world premiere musical Hell Hole Honeys by Ben Budick, Steve Mackes, and David Ogrin, directed (surprise, surprise!) by Todd Warfield!

Seeing Chris O’Neill perform the piece in New York many years ago was a particularly happy memory from a lifetime of theater-going for me, and for many others, too, I would expect. Locally, it was performed at the old Franklin Street Theatre (now the Buffalo Chop House). This might put a great deal of pressure on actor David Oliver, who will perform the piece in its current incarnation at the Adam Mickiewicz Dramatic Circle. In addition to his own talent, Mr. Oliver can take comfort in the fact that Chris O’Neill’s remarkable performance was so long ago that most of the potential audience probably did not see it.

The title of Moliere’s 1672 masterwork, The Learned Ladies, is heavily ironic, for the erudition of these ladies of learning is superficial at best. Chrysale’s bossy wife has established a salon of learned ladies in his household, indeed they have overrun the house. Their scholarly pose, however, serves merely to disguise their true passion, mindless social climbing, and in a maneuver familiar to fans of Moliere, they have fallen victim to a charlatan and poseur, Monsieur Trissotin. Created in the mold of Tartuffe, Trissotin plans to marry Chrysale’s daughter, and to abscond with his money, ostensibly to build his own school for women.