Around the World in 80 Days

Next week, the B Street Theatre revives the most popular production in the company’s history: an action-packed, five-actor adaptation of Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days. There will be five performances, then the show departs for a two-week tour of India.

The play is a cavalcade of costumes, sound cues (howling storms, raging elephants) and rapid entrances and exits, as the formal, chivalrous Phileas Fogg attempts to circle the globe in record time, on a gentlemanly wager.

It’s not your typical B Street fare. Usually, B Street favors new scripts tinged with a smidge of moral ambiguity and innuendo; but 80 Days is a decidedly 19th-century fairy tale. Fogg’s heroic determination to uphold honor and duty (and the broad slapstick comedy that results) are more akin to B Street’s Family Series shows than to the sexier, financially vulnerable, stressed-out moderns found in most B Street Mainstage shows.

The original cast of B Street’s 2004 production returns: Michael Stevenson, Amy Resnick, Greg Alexander, Elisabeth Nunziato and David Pierini—all 10 years older and wiser (80 Days was also revived in 2008).

The previews (February 11, 12 and 13, at 7 p.m.) cost $40 to attend. A Valentine’s Day performance at 7 p.m. and the February 15 “bon voyage” performance at 8 p.m. both cost $80 and include a cast reception, catered treats, champagne, chocolates and a presentation by producing artistic director Buck Busfield, who’ll likely mention the company’s long-planned new Midtown venue; the groundbreaking could be this fall. Call (916) 443-5300 or visit www.bstreettheatre.org for more information.