‘Ideal Husband’ could use editing

More than 40 years ago, when the Costa Mesa Civic Playhouse was born, its founding director, the late Pati Tambellini, was an absolute wizard at streamlining ? scraping the fat off overstuffed plays without sacrificing any salient points.

One wonders what Pati might have made of “An Ideal Husband,” Oscar Wilde’s late-19th century opus and the playhouse’s current production. The guess here is that about 45 minutes of the play’s current running time of nearly three hours would have been jettisoned with no loss of pertinent content.

There is, underneath all the Victorian costumes and inconsequential dialogue, a lean, witty play striving to get out ? which it does, eventually, after a series of chatty segments that impede rather than further the story. Wilde’s savage sarcasm would project an even sharper image if superfluous material had been omitted.

Director Ryan Holihan has elected to present the play in its bloated entirety, thus diverting his audience’s attention away from the central themes of blackmail and underhanded dealings in public office, which threaten to terminate a politician’s career and his marriage. Following an overlong and meandering first act, the production zeroes in on its primary mission in the second.

That mission centers on an English nobleman (John Sturgeon) who, as an ambitious young politician, sold government secrets to advance his otherwise unblemished career. This moral and ethical error is seized upon by a conniving young woman (Laura Lindahl) with her own shady agenda, and it falls to the official’s close friend (Christopher Diehl) to subvert the lovely villainess ? to whom he once was engaged ? and save the intended victim’s marriage.

Sturgeon is solid and convincing as the blackmail target, projecting his conflict and consternation effectively, while Lindahl oozes through her assignment with more than a dash of melodrama. Watching her circle and ultimately corner her prey partially compensates for the moments in which style triumphs over substance.

The prime performance of the evening comes from Diehl, who also is charged with dispensing Wilde’s pungent pronouncements in his role as an idle upper-class fop forced by circumstance into serious thought and action. Diehl’s mastery of Wilde’s elusive sense of irony breathes some needed life into an often dormant production.

Kay Richey suffers nobly as Sturgeon’s understanding ? but only to a point ? wife, who is all too willing to sacrifice a loving marriage over ethical shortcomings. Julie Usborn charms as Sturgeon’s younger sister, who sets her cap for the elusive Diehl.

Diehl’s blustering, red-faced father, whose patience with his playboy son is rapidly dwindling, is artfully enacted by Michael Dale Brown in one of the better performances of the show. His offstage wife, Barbara Duncan Brown, also has some scenery-chewing moments, but these mostly fall into the show’s unnecessary segments.

Under the “no small parts” category, David Hammelman creates a stiffly dutiful butler who can’t help but be noticed even as he’s blending into the scenery. Travis Stolp nearly matches this effort in another subservient role.

Other performers ? Anne Davanni, Cherie Aniceto, Kelley Beld, Mike Sandell ? populate the stage in window-dressing assignments that enhance the play cosmetically but detract in substance. The settings by Kathy and Steve Endicott are nicely accomplished but should be identified in the program as to location.

“An Ideal Husband” would, ideally, enroll in Weight Watchers to shed several pounds of excess literary avoirdupois. What remains, under its bulky exterior, is a healthy exercise in comedy, drama and, above all, wit.

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