‘The Scarlet Pimpernel’ wows at Candlelight

The swashbuckling musical shines in a nearly flawless production north of Denver

Steve Wilson directed Vintage Theatre’s wonderful production of The One Act Play That Goes Wrong last spring, and he’s back with a bang-up job for a musical where everything goes absolutely right. This Candlelight Dinner Theatre production of The Scarlet Pimpernel is damn-near perfect, with all of its many moving parts coming together beautifully to create a truly enjoyable night at the theatre.

Now in its 15^th season, Candlelight has proven time and again that its location in a steel building among the truck stops, gas wells and RV dealerships in the nether region between Denver and Fort Collins doesn’t stop it from offering top-flight entertainment. And while it sticks mostly to well-known crowd-pleasers to keep the large operation afloat, the Candlelight team always delivers. This production of The Scarlet Pimpernel is as good as anything you’d see at, say, the Arvada Center, with a great group of actors led by a skilled director and a choreographer (Carrie Colton) who’s also an experienced fight director. With music supervision by Phil Forman, the 12-piece orchestra is exceptionally good — a key piece to creating a memorable musical that many theatres can struggle to put together.

Based on a novel and stage play dating to 1903 by Baroness Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel is the story of a wealthy Brit named Percy Blakeney who, during France’s Reign of Terror in 1790 or so, takes it upon himself to rescue French aristocrats before they have a date with “Madame Guillotine.” In his Candlelight debut, Patric Case is marvelous as the heroic Blakeney who hides his derring-do behind the persona of a rich, playful fop more interested in garden parties than making surreptitious trips to Paris to whisk innocents away from blood-thirsty Jacobins.

Using the nom de guerre of a red flower (the pimpernel), Blakeney leads a band of hesitant pals to effect the rescues, soon drawing the attention of Chauvelin (Scott Hurst Jr.), the French envoy to England who’s eager to lop the heads off as many French 1-percenters as possible and who is also, bien sur, in love with Blakeney’s new wife, Marguerite (Sarah Forman).

Forman and Hurst are familiar faces at Candlelight, and both deliver excellent performances. A powerful baritone who looks quite the part in his black costume, Hurst is up to the challenge of holding his own against Case’s commanding stage presence. Forman is a lot of fun to watch as the perky Marguerite trying to manage her love for both men combined with her suspicion that Percy was a mistake (he doesn’t reveal his secret identity to her, resulting in a lot of suspicion and misunderstanding) while Chauvelin, despite some small matters involving blackmail, still looks pretty studly to her.

Sarah Forman as Marguerite is surrounded by servants in the Candlelight production of ‘The Scarlet Pimpernel’ | Photo: RDG Photography

A really big show

Candlelight’s production crew pulled out the stops for this one, with a huge, fantastic set designed by Brian Watson that includes marble-ish stairs, arches, columns and chandeliers with a colossal red pimpernel hovering over all. Ronn Campbell’s lighting design also stands out, striking a nice balance between making things dark enough for the story but light enough for the audience to see it all. The costumes by Deb Faber and wigs by Debbie Spaur are quite good, grounding us firmly in the period.

The Scarlett Pimpernel has a good deal of swordplay and fighting in it, and this production simply wouldn’t be what it is without Colton’s work expertly staging all of that. All of the sword fighting is incredibly convincing, as are more simple bits like kicks and punches. She also manages the dance choreography, of which there’s a decent amount.

Despite all the fighting, Pimpernel has a lot of laughs — many of which are zingers delivered with rapid-fire precision by Case’s character. The fact that the main villain, Chauvelin, is often on enemy soil gives Percy plenty of opportunity to rib him tremendously while the rest laugh. It helps drive the end scenes where Chauvelin is the one in power reveling in his planned terrible revenge against Percy and his gang.

This may be the best show I’ve seen at Candlelight, and it’s clear the production was staged with a whole lotta love and many long hours of rehearsal. Although it does have some violence and a beheading or two, generally speaking it’s a pretty good show to bring kids over 10 to, and boys in particular would no doubt love it.

Candlelight does a pretty good job with its food and beverage service, a step above what you might typically find at a dinner theatre. All in all it makes for a very enjoyable night at the theatre. Even if you have to drive a bit to get there, it’s well worth the trip.