For Their First Production, A New Theater Company Adapts The Room

Staging a theatrical adaptation of The Room as your first production is a little bit genius.

Widely regarded as one of the worst movies ever, The Room is loved for being really bad. This gives Mister Theater, a brand new theater still under construction, a bit of a buffer. Low production values are practically required, and anything that doesn't go smoothly just adds to the effect.

Written, produced by, and starring Tommy Wiseau, the movie is loosely about Wiseau's character Johnny who is brought down by his cheating fiancé Lisa despite the fact that everyone else thinks he's great. It features intriguingly flat acting, absurd dialogue, and a hole-ridden plot, which Mister Theater faithfully portrays. The sex scenes contain the driest of all dry humping, and there's lines like "I'm saving a fortune to give away to my friends who never betray me," delivered by Mister Theater co-founder Montetré with a deadness worthy of Wiseau's original performance.

The show is basically the same gag the entire time: intentionally terrible acting and flimsy characterization. But the production manages to feel pretty entertaining for the whole two hours, largely due to Montetré's performance as Johnny. His impression of Wiseau is uncanny: from his bizarre posture, to his mouth breathing to Wiseau's unidentifiable accent and unsettling chuckle.

Still, Mister Theater is appealing to a relatively niche audience–that is, fans of The Room (though not that niche considering the number of Portlanders signed up for The Room's dating site). And with references like the "heckling spoons" handed out for the audience to throw at the actors, the production often feels like an in-joke.

If anything, Mister Theater's The Room isn't bad enough. In the hands of the theater company, it's more of a campy romp than cringe-inducing black humor. Obviously, the actors in this production aren't going to take the material as seriously as its original creators (probably?) did, but the fact that the movie is so unintentionally bad is what makes it so fascinating. You get the sense that this production is actively uninterested in being compelling, though. It's just interested in being funny–and it is. 

SEE IT: The Room plays at Mister Theater, 1857 E Burnside St., No. 101, mistertheater.com. 8 pm Thursday-Sunday, Nov. 17-Dec. 18. No show Thursday, Nov. 24 and Sunday, Dec. 4. $5-$20.