Something Rotten!

"Something Rotten," the Shakespeare-themed musical filling the gap at the Orpheum Theater now that "Hamilton" left town, is about as fluffy, lightweight and disposable a piece of comedy as you'll ever find onstage. But that can be a good thing.

This farce by former BBC writer John O'Farrell follows Nick (a Steve Carrell-like John McClure), a struggling Elizabethan playwright stuck in Shakespeare's shadow.

This leads almost immediately into composer and lyricist brother duo Wayne and Kerry Kirkpatrick's best song, "I Hate Shakespeare," a jaunty little tune where Nick airs his grievances with a cathartic wink to the audience.

Everybody hates Shakespeare sometimes. We love Shakespeare, which means now and then we hate him too because people are complicated and art is challenging and seriously what do you want from us anyway?

The gag here is that Nick tries to pay a soothsayer (Blake Hammond in full Borsch Belt mode) to tip him off about what the greatest theatrical hits of the future will be and get a leg up on Shakes.

The dicey diviner gives him the plot of "Hamlet," except of course he bungles the fine details. Oh, but he also gives Nick the anachronistic idea of staging the first musical several centuries early.

You'll notice that the whole story is built on top of two almost entirely different gags, one lampooning Shakespeare (and through him our relationship with fame and acclaim) and one parodying Broadway itself. In the latter mode "Something Rotten" is to musical theater what "Book of Mormon" is to, well, the Book of Mormon.

Trying to always do two things at once like this doesn't necessarily help the show, any more than trying to build the same house in two different spots would add up to a sound foundation anywhere. Just like having two different but functionally identical scenes with the soothsayer doesn't make either any funnier.

By and large, "Something Rotten" is trying to power through on charm and wit, hoping director Casey Nicholaw can help everyone fake it until they make it and the audience papers over those kinds of problems in our minds.

And in fact, this plan largely works. Josh Grisetti plays Nick's brother Nigel, a secret Shakespeare fanboy chasing a star-crossed romance with a Puritan's daughter (Maggie Lakis).

Autumn Hurlburt is wife Portia, who takes to dressing like a man so she can do odd jobs and support the family while Nick's career flounders. (Couples in the crowd that include creative types may be able to relate too well to this.)

None of these subplots go much of anywhere, but everyone looks good in Greg Barnes' flamboyant but more or less period costumes, Scott Pask's set includes a tiny "wooden O" style theater within a theater to delight Shakespeare fans, and the jokes, while often obvious, brim with good-natured, comfort food-style humor that works on basically everyone.

That's not to say that "Something Rotten" lacks any sophistication at all. Take the huge showstopper tribute to Broadway song "A Musical," which of course is little more than references to other songs in other successful musicals.

Not only does this huge number whip the audience into a frenzy, but the very next lines in the show (once everyone sits down and lets the show go on again) directly reference the reaction it knows it just got. So "Something Rotten" is very aware of itself after all.

We'd be remiss not to mention Adam Pascal (the very first Roger in "RENT,") as Shakespeare, playing him as a kind of off-brand Russell Brand rock star with a blond goatee and a collar that could double as a deadly weapon in a fight.

The character is all over the place -- he's technically the show's villain but in the end, we're expected to forgive and forget seemingly just because he's Shakespeare -- but in this case, it's largely just a tool for Pascal to ham it up. He also gets the show's other best song, "Hard To Be the Bard."

"Something Rotten" ain't exactly Shakespeare... intentionally, in this case. But sometimes just being funny enough is all it takes, and life is really too short not to like a show like this now and then.

"Something Rotten" plays through September 10 at the Orpheum, 1192 Market Street. For tickets and information, call 888-746-1799 or visit ShnSF.com.