A game cast can’t overcome a pieced-together script that’s tough to follow.

Playwright Ken Ludwig prefaces his script for Moriarty with a description of how he created it by stitching together plotlines and characters after reading more than 50 of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes short stories. Only one of them, “The Final Problem,” includes an appearance by Holmes’ evil nemesis, Professor Moriarty. That story, Ludwig also notes, plays more like a melodrama than a typical whodunit — and the built the play the same way.

That’s an important thing to keep in mind when watching Creede Repertory Theatre’s production of Ken Ludwig’s Moriarty. I went in expecting something more like Ludwig’s last Holmesian adventure, Baskerville, so the madcap tone of Moriarty took me by surprise. It’s more like an episode of Scooby-Doo, with Director Steven Cole Hughes deploys every silly gag in the book with a small, game cast playing numerous roles. It’s a high-speed comedy that combines farce with melodrama and many cartoonish elements meant to deliver a laugh in nearly every line.

Creating a play like this always carries with it the risk of going too far, since throwing too many things at the wall for comic effect can undermine the audience’s ability to keep up. Lifting elements from different stories compounds the risk, and in Moriarty what we’re left with is a series of vignettes with a shaky throughline that only delivers sporadically.

It is quite funny in parts, and all the business around it — the wigs, costumes, moving set pieces and other stagecraft — combines for an entertaining package. Certainly, the nearly full house on the night I saw it seemed to enjoy it thoroughly even if many (I’m guessing) had no idea what was going on.

(From left), Anne Faith Butler, Noelia Antweiler, Zachary Chiero, Logon Ernstthal and Graham Ward in ‘Ken Ludwig’s Moriarty.’ | Photo: Brooke Ashlee Photography

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One busy cast

Similar to how Ludwig built Baskerville, this one gets the job done with a small cast playing many parts. Graham Ward and Zachary Chiero stay put as Holmes and as Watson; Logan Ernstthal, Noelia Antweiler and Anne Faith Butler combine to handle about 20 different roles. That alone provides a comic foundation as quick costume changes and manic comings and goings give the play its relentless pace.

The plot centers on some letters stolen from the King of Bohemia (Ernstthal) that somehow threaten world peace. Holmes and Watson team up with American actress Irene Adler (Antweiler) to chase after Moriarty and his henchmen (mostly Ernstthal). Although Adler was never a love interest of Holmes in the only story in which she appeared (“A Scandal in Bohemia”), Ludwig elevates the character here to add a romantic twist.

Missing from the story is a clearly defined relationship between Holmes and Watson, leaving Ward and Chiero with few opportunities to assert their characters alongside everything else going on. Action is the main driver throughout, and CRT’s creative and stage-management teams do yeoman’s work keeping it all on track.

Even if the two heroes aren’t quite what we’d expect, characters played by Antweiler, Ernstthal and Butler drive plenty of the fun. Antweiler successfully careens between the heroic Adler to Holmes’ Baker Street landlady Mrs. Hudson to Cartwright, a street kid with an impenetrable Cockney accent.

Ernstthal’s Moriarty is the enigmatic, evil and slippery figure you’d expect him to be, and he also does a nice job as the recurring Scotland Yard detective Lestrade (among many others). Longtime company member Anne Faith Butler works hardest of all, cycling through eight roles ranging from a Bohemian functionary to a vicar to Toby the tracking dog.

Together it’s an impressive workout for the cast — though in places Hughes pushes certain gags past their expiration date.

Moriarty, for example, gets his own ominous musical sting whenever his name is mentioned. Holmes doesn’t, and the first time or two he chafes at this is worth a laugh; not so much the several more that follow. Another bit with Watson trying and failing to close some drapes loses its comic appeal after the first few attempts, yet keeps going.

Though far from Ludwig’s best work, Moriarty is the kind of show one can take in and enjoy for its better parts. As light summer-stock fare, it’s a well-done production that still draws a crowd because of the seemingly bottomless appeal of Sherlock Holmes.