Abbott and Costello, George and Gracie and Cellino and Barnes? The two name partners of that famous, well advertised law firm hardly sound like they would fit in the company of comic teams. But Mike B. Breen's and David Rafailedes’s play “Cellino v. Barnes” with Eric William Morris as Ross Cellino and Noah Weisberg as Steve Barnes is a hilarious comedy about two attorneys with their eyes firmly focused on the prize (the bright and shiny prize, that is), even if it means cheating or breaking a rule or two or three or more.
Absurdity has never been more appealing than in this production. At least for me, the verdict was clear early on: This is a wonderfully entertaining, funny show about two people whose laser focus on success leads them to ignore everything else, generating a lot of laughter. Justice may not be blind, but these are blind to their obligations under the law, but not to the ability to get laughs. Part farce, part stand-up it's just all fun. You may not connect that deeply with the characters and the portrayal may be a little superficial, rather than personal, but is is always entertaining and this show scores as high on the laughometer as any I've seen in a long time. If you're looking for a good time, this show is a good place to start.
The play starts when Weisberg as Barnes goes in for an interview with Morris as Cellino, stealing all the questions and preparing his answers. When he’s caught, he thinks the interview is over. He’s right, because Cellino, who is trying to take his father’s firm to the next level, wants to hire him on the spot. Morris is an honest crook who can’t contain his glee at short curs and a kindred spirit who believes the end, which is making money, justifies the means. What follows is a farcical look at how advertising can turn the legal profession into a way to milk cases, like cows, for money.
We hear about the strategy of suing Great Adventure (even if it has more flags than a regiment) not to win, but to intimidate everyone else so they’ll settle. They live in a world of twisted logic where they dare to think differently. We’re with them in their eureka moment when their jingle, not their jurisprudence, sets them above and apart from others. Wesley Taylor and Alex Wyse direct the show smoothly full of action with just enough sight gags to be funny, without feeling like cheap laughs. Of course, this duo’s short cuts do create somewhat of a problem. Cellino basically lends money to their clients against their verdict, but at high rates, which is illegal.
That leads to a falling out as these best buddies break up and go their own ways. Even the Beatles split. Why shouldn’t two lawyers whose names are wedded together on thousands of benches, which we are told are the secret to their success. Their genius is to recognize that fame can lead to fortune. Law is a business, not just a service. Their true eureka is a recognition that you can sell law like detergent. It is not special and not different.
They simply want to get cases and win them. Why chase the ambulances when you could “be” the ambulances? Go into healthcare and now have medical and legal and you’ve really got something. They are visionary in a funny way. When the two split, it’s comic more than tragic as these not always kindred spirits separate and we find out nobody gets custody of the brand. They attack each other, after deciding to communicate only with passive aggressive emails. We see them in a boxing ring and with cards showing schemes. Cellino and Barnes are very different from each other, just as George and Gracie and Abbott and Costello were. That difference, it seems, amplifies the comedy. The actors are a great comic team.
We don’t really get much of a glimpse of their humanity, of course, but then this is hardly a biopic dramatizing difficulties. Instead, we watch these two attorneys laughing to the bank. After they split, they each flail around, going their own way. The truth is, it seems, they were a great team, daring to do things differently, even if they went too far. The show is full of gags that work, in part because it’s such a good comic cast. There’s a small stage surrounded by towers of boxes and filing cabinets. That’s the “real” legal work, which they ignore. The actors and script turn that tiny stage into a great arena. The one liners fly fast and land. It feels a little bit like stand up, but the chemistry is there. When we see a Playboy magazine with a famous McDonald's law suit as the centerfold, it's absurd, but handled with such matter of fact hero worship that it makes comic sense.
I’m not sure what the two name partners were like as lawyers, but as comic characters, in this show, they are very well worth a visit. They idolize the lawyer who won a $2.7 million Liebeck v. Mcdonald's Restaurants verdict (the centerfold) for a woman who burned herself with a 49-cent cup of Joe. The details of the case, not quite as comical, but ironic, aren’t in the show. Liebeck sued for $20,000, but McDonald’s only offered $800, which led to the case and the multi-million meltdown. They tried to save $1,200, which was a magnificent mistake. And then there’s the fact that McDonald’s made its coffee much hotter than other chains and had faced at least 700 claims due to burns. That’s not in the show, because it’s funnier to think of how frivolous that multi-million-dollar McDonald’s coffee was, rather than the fact that, maybe, there was an element of consumer protection. Yes, it was absurd, but there also was an actual abuse, at least possibly, in terms of practice and policy.
The reality is lawyers do play an important role in protecting and obtaining justice, not just milking the system. But in the world of this show, the cases are about money, not justice, providing a veritable jukebox of laughter. I’m not sure where the idea came from to turn Cellino and Barnes into a comic duo. But the show is brilliantly cast, directed, staged and performed. The two attorneys are likeable and believable in the way things are as performance if not exactly people. After leaving the show, I heard and ad for Cellino, a successor firm. Maybe the real Cellino and Barnes see the show as free advertising, even if these are comic portrayals. I do know that I laughed loud and often and left the show smiling. While it’s not exactly a musical, there is that song that once flowed across the air waves, like a siren song, attracting business. I’m still smiling hours later, but I just wish I could get that damn jingle out of my head.
As funny as theater gets!