By Dion Boucicault. Directed by Adam Henderson. A United Players production. At the Jericho Arts Centre on Saturday, June 2. Continues until June 24

Director Adam Henderson’s production of the early Victorian comedy London Assurance slips in and out of its comic groove but, in Act 2 especially, it spends an impressive amount of time on just the right track. That’s because Henderson knows what he’s doing and his actors are having a blast.

In the script, which premiered in 1841, Sir Harcourt Courtly, a 57-year-old prat who regards himself as the acme of stylishness, plans to marry Grace Harkaway, a beautiful, intelligent 18-year-old heiress. (There’s a complicated—and unlikely—convention about a legal will that sets Sir Harcourt’s plan in motion). At first, the pragmatic Grace agrees to go along with the marriage, but she changes her mind when she meets the bewigged Sir Harcourt and his handsome 25-year-old son, Charles. Guess who ends up heading for the altar.

The pleasures in this play aren’t primarily about suspense; they’re about absurdity—especially the absurdities of the British upper class. The most surprising character is Lady Gay Spanker, a hearty, highly sexual woman who wields a mean riding crop. And, because Sir Harcourt pursues Grace at the heiress’s rural estate, we get a lot of town-and-country jokes. When the evening’s entertainment is announced, Sir Harcourt sniffs, “What are the requirements of this country dance—clogs and a sheep?” And there’s flat-out physical farce; some of the best involves a loaded blunderbuss that Grace’s uncle keeps around to shoot rats in the house. “It’s tremendous sport,” he says, “but not very good for the carpets.”

Playing comedy is all about hitting the right stylistic note, and getting a large cast—especially a mostly amateur group like this one—all pulling in the same stylistic direction can be difficult. But, under Henderson’s guidance, most of the players here understand that their characters relish who they are and what they’re doing. Stylistically, the point is to have enthusiastic fun.

Sir Harcourt is a monster of narcissism but, as actor Keith Martin Gordey shows us, his buoyant self-regard makes him a happy monster. Cara McDowell finds so much robust good humour in Lady Gay that I started to find her riding crop appealing. And Brian Hinson is terrifically droll as Cool, the Courtly family’s butler.

All of this said, there are holes in both the script and the production. Some of the material, including a running gag in which a lawyer named Meddle’s name is mispronounced as Fiddle, Piddle, and so on, is dumb. In this production, the timing goes off the rails in some scenes and some of the acting lacks focus. Actor Mitch Hookey’s take on Charles is energetic but physically undisciplined—in his drunkenness, for instance, Hookey’s Charles deliberately staggers, as opposed to trying to stand straight—and Anna Robin grimaces and bobbles her head as Pert, the maid. Still, I’d rather have unfocused commitment than too little commitment.

Henderson’s scene changes are stylin’, which is a bonus. As some cast members manually turn the revolve to reveal new aspects of John R. Taylor’s budget-minded but handsome set, others sing, play instruments, and dance.

Very jolly.