‘Hotel Paradiso’ offers a San Francisco romp

After all that heavy turkey and stuffing, the Modesto Junior College theater department is serving up some lighter fare.

The French farce “Welcome to the Hotel Paradiso” has been adapted with a Northern California twist for the production opening next week at the MJC East Campus. Based on the comedy “L’Hôtel du libre échange” by French playwrights Georges Feydeau and Maurice Desvallieres, the play has been transported to 1890s San Francisco by MJC theater professor Michael Lynch, who wrote the adaption and directs the show.

“What I wanted to do was set it in San Francisco in the late 19th century. So I made some changes to the characters to make it more San Francisco-like,” Lynch said.

The play opens Tuesday, Dec. 1, with a special student preview sight showing and then runs Wednesday-Sunday, Dec. 2-6, at the Little Theatre.

The story is set in a hotel and follows two people attempting to have an affair as things go comically wrong. Lynch said the show is filled with the kinds of classic misunderstandings that typify fast-paced French farce.

“We’ve got all the slamming doors and mistaken identities you could want,” he said.

Lynch has relocated the story from Paris to San Francisco’s Divisadero Street. Characters have been renamed after iconic places and people, like Sonora Sam and Laffing Sal. The cast of more than 20 features largely MJC students as well as a few local actors. They include Melissa Dawn, Shane Meyers, Nick Salvucci, Aida Rawls, Jesse Arnett, Erin Isaacs, Robin Bjerke and real-life twins Andrew Brown and Garrett Brown.

The one change Lynch made, out of respect to the recent terror attacks in Paris, is to take out some gunshots originally heard in the production. Other than that, he assures weary holiday audiences that show should he a fast-paced and fanciful romp.

“It’s fun, fun, fun. There is a lot of running around, a lot of very exaggerated characters. It’s very colorful.”

This story was originally published November 24, 2015 at 3:25 PM with the headline "‘Hotel Paradiso’ offers a San Francisco romp."