Dad’s Garage sketches a familiar Business model

The funny folks at Dad’s Garage Theatre seem more likely to read the Onion than the Wall Street Journal, so the economic themes of The Dad’s Garage Going Out of Business Show push the company a bit outside its comfort zone. Curated by Matt Horgan and written by “the Dad’s Garage artistic family,” the evening of sketches takes inspiration from the current economic slump and builds gags around corporate layoffs, mortgage loans, unemployment applications and the state of the dollar. Horgan even wears a giant foam greenback to play “Dollar Bill” as a sickly kvetch with one foot in the grave.

Despite tearing the premise from today’s headlines, the company’s execution feels slightly old-fashioned. Some sketches rely on predictable targets and highly familiar ideas, including a George W. Bush impersonation, happy-talk newscasters, a riff on an old “Schoolhouse Rock” tune and a “We Are the World” parody called “We Are the Rich.” A video spoof of “Girls Gone Wild” gets plenty of laughs, though, and a piece with a financial consultant (Gina Rickicki) trying to help a spendthrift board game mascot (Horgan) only suffers from its similarity to another sketch from the playhouse’s Fingertips last summer.

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(Photo by Linnea Frye)