Rooting around for laughs

For her role in South Coast Repertory’s newest production, Blake Lindsley had to brush up on her backhand, but her character Tina isn’t a tennis champ — or any sort of athlete for that matter.

She’s learning the move so she can properly wallop her husband Tom across the forehead with a rolling pin in one of several heated scenes from “Pig Farm,” a new comedy from “Urinetown” author Greg Kotis, coming to the theater this weekend.

As of Wednesday, none of the play’s four actors had received any serious injuries during rehearsal, perhaps owing to the training of fight coordinator Martin Noyes. Though director Martin Benson promises a show full of physical action and plenty of mud, audiences can plan to stay clean and dry.

“I love the physical violence of the show, and the sexiness too,” Benson said. “Those are fun scenes to stage.”

Set on a contemporary pig farm somewhere in the Midwest, the play depicts the life of pig farmers Tom and Tina as they struggle to get an accurate pig count in time to report to Teddy, an Environmental Protection Agency representative on his way to the farm.

Tom hires Tim — a farm hand recently released from juvenile hall — to help, though he becomes more of a hindrance when he falls in love with Tina and accidentally sets the pigs loose.

“Audiences should expect to have a good time, to laugh and to enjoy the predicaments of all the characters,” said JD Cullum, who plays Teddy. “It’s totally absurdist and funny.”

Cullum is a regular at South Coast, and Lindsley returns for her second play at the theater. Brad Fleischer (Tim) and Steve Rankin (Tom) will make their debuts with “Pig Farm,” though both are seasoned actors.

Rankin performed in several off-Broadway productions and appeared regularly on “The West Wing” and other television shows. He’s also appeared the films “L.A. Confidential” and “Pearl Harbor.”

Benson brings his experience as the director of nearly one-third of South Coast’s plays, in addition to agricultural knowledge he has gained spending time on a friend’s cattle ranch every year.

But in all his time at the theater, he’s never before worked with pigs.

“It’s so novel to have a play set on a pig farm,” he said. “I’ve done a couple of plays set on a farm, but not a pig farm.”

Also the artistic director at South Coast Repertory, Benson said the play illustrates the traditional American farm and all the difficulties associated with running such a business in a world largely taken over by corporate farms.

While the comedy’s setting is realistic, Tony-winner Kotis wrote the play as a farce. Not many family-owned farms house 14,222 pigs, the number Tom and Tina purport to have.

“Kotis deliberately pushes the envelope so that anything is possible,” Benson said. “It’s ludicrous, but funny.”

IF YOU GO:

WHAT: “Pig Farm”

WHEN: Previews run Jan. 7 to 11; 2 p.m. Sunday, and 7:45 Tuesday through Thursday. The show opens Jan. 12 and runs through Jan. 28, playing at 7:45 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays, and 2 and 7:45 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays.

WHERE: South Coast Repertory’s Julianne Argyros Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa

COST: Previews $20 to $42; regular performances $28 to $60

INFO: The 2 p.m. show on Jan. 13 will be “Pay-What-You-Will,” and the 2 p.m. show on Jan. 27 will be American Sign Language interpreted. There will be post-show discussions with cast members following the Jan. 16 and 17 performances. For tickets and more information, go to https://www.scr.org or call (714) 708-5555.