Diablo Light Opera Company underlined its commitment to producing new musicals Friday, not only by staging a captivating production of "The Scarlet Pimpernel," but with a pre-show announcement that next year's season will include "Ragtime," the massive musical version of E.L. Doctorow's sweeping novel of early 20th Century America. But that comes later.

Friday, it was "Pimpernel" that charmed and teased the audience with the sort of swashbuckling silliness that makes the century-old fascination with British derring-do a hilariously breathtaking treat for contemporary audiences. The trick -- not too difficult, but completely missed by the Broadway road company that traveled through the Bay Area not long ago-- requires that the only people in the theater who take the tale of international intrigue and heroism seriously are those on stage. The more deadly serious they are about the task at hand, the funnier it becomes to the rest of us.

Director/choreographer Frank Coppola leads a rock-solid cast, stone-faced and serious, into 16th century England, where a group of British upper class fops find themselves taking on the responsibility of bringing an end to the revolution, and the especially cruel Chauvelin (Dave Miailovich). It seems citizen Chauvelin has shut down the theater in which Marguerite St. Just (Lane McKenna) has just given her last performance, so she can marry Percy (Keith Barlow) a British noble, whose sole talent appears to be a knack for accessorizing. It's all part of Chauvelin's plan to make Paris as dull as Visalia on a Wednesday night. Then, when Percy returns home with Marguerite and her brother Armand (Charlie Levy), it becomes increasingly apparent it is the sworn duty of the British upper crust to stage secret military activities to thwart Chauvelin, who later kidnaps Armand. Percy, who assumes the secret identity of the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel, master of disguise and covert operations, has recruited his pals, as fey and foppish a bunch as you'd ever want to meet, to serve as operatives. Their mission: to sneak into France under the guise of buying satin and lace and do their guerrilla work completely unsuspected.

It's actually not a bad swashbuckling story, but where it would play as an edge-of-the-seat thriller in 1905, it plays wickedly funny today -- and the cast takes every advantage of that. Barlow is outstanding as Percy, turning him into a brave man of action who still knows how to correctly fold a pocket handkerchief. McKenna is a delight as Marguerite, Michelle Krapp delivers some excellent singing as Marie and Levy is delightfully evil as Chauvelin.
The cast is helped at every turn by the clever and attractive staging of the musical, beginning with a complicated soundscape by Carole Davis and lighting by Paul Miller. He's created a fascinating look for the show by crafting the illusion of footlights and using the large shadows they cast on the stage as a subtle part of the set.

And the set, by Kelly Tighe, is a wonderfully versatile piece of work that represents everything from a proper English library to a French guillotine plaza to a sailing ship. The uniting theme here is that most of the scenes appear to be coming out of paintings of the era.
The costumes, coordinated by Carol Edlinger with wigs by Kerry Rider-Kuhn, also help create the lovely picture presented by the musical. Thanks to the large orchestra directed by Cheryl Yee Glass, "The Scarlet Pimpernel" sounds as beautiful at it looks. The show has an amazing amount of wonderful music, including lovely ballads like "I'll Forget You" and "When I Look at You," but the real delight comes in the big, often funny production numbers, such as "Into the Fire" and "The Creation of Man."

This is one of DLOC's best and it should encourage production of more new material -- especially since it seems that some of the long-running contemporary musicals are becoming available to local groups.