OTTAWA -- The Number 14 pulled into the Great Canadian Theatre Company promising a rollicking road comedy.

Instead, it slipped its clutch and got stuck in gear backing out of the first act.

Set inside a municipal bus for a 21/2-hour ride, The Number 14 is a vehicle where outrageous characters collide with reality and fantasy in this strange circus of social satire.

A viral derelict shares a seat with an anal neat-freak, seniors sharing Parkinson's all shake on cue, English actors behave as if they were still on the Elizabethan stage and an Italian real estate agent dresses as if the bus were her own boudoir.

The Number 14 is comedy with a short attention span. Divided into 18 skits with an intro and a coda, this clown show is a furious flurry of short, character-driven comedies and the modus operandi is the crazier the character, the better.

The cast, Brian Anderson, Scott Bellis, Darlene Brookes, Marjorie Malpass, Mike Stack and Gordon White, fortified by Melody Anderson's astonishing masks, perform fearlessly, stretching a visual pun or a word-play to it's comedic limits. Occasionally, they go too far. But the company's sense of contagious playfulness doesn't altogether mask the flatness of some of their skits.

When they're at their best, performing pure mimed clown work, the comedy pays off healthy dividends. The gymnastic old lady scene, the kindergarten class, the nerdy neat freak, the magazine dance, remind me of Benny Hill in his better moments.

But too often their burlesque is just outrageous rather than funny. English thespians is hackneyed, as is private school girls and the chorus of Parkinson's seniors drag the production to a standstill.

And running at 150 minutes, what might have been funny in miniature turns out to be redundant in full, begging the burlesque hook.

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