“CABARET” is at the Westminster Community Playhouse through June 9 (Sarah Whitwell).

By Thom deMartino/Orange County Tribune

The road to fascism is a damnable, slippery slope: paved with the perilous, slick cobblestones of indifference, rationalization, equivocation and lethargy.

And when one’s started the steep tumble down that deceptive, unforgiving path, there’s no recognition of what’s become of the world they once knew, until it’s far too late – reaching that realization only in a final, fatal moment of impact.

Director Stephen Gomer and the players of the Westminster Community Playhouse have staged an audacious and provocative new rendition of the classic musical “Cabaret” in their diminutive, beloved theater — demonstrating once again, that powerful things can indeed come in small packages.

It’s New Year’s in 1929 Germany, in the years before World War II: during the slow, insidious creep of Nazism rising to power in the country. American writer Clifford Bradshaw (Edward Bangasser) has only just arrived in the presently libertine Berlin, eager for experience to inspire his novel: and he is promptly taken under the wing of fellow traveler (and casual smuggler of goods), the affable Ernst (Trevin Stephenson).

Both Cliff and the audience are introduced to the lascivious Kit Kat Klub – a delectable den of debauchery, featuring an array of beautiful ladies (and gentlemen, if that’s more to your tastes.) The mesmerizing Emcee (a masterful Dimitri Tiatia-Garaud, in his first WCP outing) leads the troupe of seductive showgirls, headlined by the brazen, boisterous leading lady Sally Bowles (Jennifer Ann Marks) … who is also rapidly falling out of favor with the club’s owner (as well as her lover and landlord) Max (Mike Marmont).

Evicted by Max, Sally turns up on Cliff’s doorstep with a seductive look in her eye, at the quaint boarding house run by the cheery Fraulein Schneider (Sherry Domerego) – who herself has a budding romance with one of her other tenants, the buoyant Herr Schultz (Richard Comeau). Meanwhile another tenant, the lusty Fraulien Kost (a charming Rachel Girardet, in dual roles as both Kost and dancer Fritzie) is meeting with local sailors in her room to make ends meet (much to her landlady’s chagrin.)

Persuading Cliff to let her stay with him, the pair are soon enmeshed in their own passionate affair, as the show goes on at the Kit Kat without Sally, with the licentiousness and levity non-stop… as events around them begin to take a darker turn. And while the players themselves feel unchanged by the affairs around them, how long will it be before the world changes them?

This is a striking new production being staged at the popular Westminster Community Playhouse, and a timely one: illustrating events not so different from the ones of present day, demonstrating how history can’t help but repeat itself, despite the lessons we’ve thought we’ve learned from it.

It’s a phenomenal team effort, not only through the performances of the main cast, but so too in the breathtaking choreography by the rest of the Kit Kat ensemble (including Katie Mathers, Ashley Stewart, Makenna Butcher, Lea Mano, Girardet, Ava Melgoza, Ethan Trejo, Adrian van der Valk and Matt Kim, playing Rosie, LuLu, Frenchie, Texas, Fritzie, Helga, Bobby, Victor and Hans, respectively.) Adding to the atmosphere is the superlative, deft work of the band, comprised of keyboardist Bill Wolfe and drummer Jeff Segal.

This is one to be proud of.

As mentioned, WCP is an intimate venue — yet they somehow manage to make the Kit Kat Klub larger than life, as do the exceptional performances by Tatia-Garaud, Marks, Bangasser, Domerego and Comeau.

Stephensons’ Ernst, too… such a colorful, likeable, entertaining figure… does an outstanding job absolutely breaking your heart later in the tale, demonstrating that even those we love may have their dark side – and challenging the viewer with the difficult question: how and where do we draw the line?

A remarkable display by an impressive bevy of performers, “Cabaret” at WCP is one to witness as soon as you’re able, one to entertain, titillate and make you think. And still playing for another two weeks, it’s one you’ll be thinking about for some time to come, long after you’ve left the theater.

“Cabaret” Dimitri Tiatia-Garaud, Jennifer Ann Marks and Edward Bangasser star in this beautiful spectacle, telling a tale of pre-WWII Germany and the lives and loves of those soon to fall beneath fascism’s shadow. Playing through June 9 at the Westminster Community Playhouse, 7272 Maple St, Westminster. Ticketing information available online at http://www.wcpstage.com, or call (714) 893-8626. Some mature language and themes.