Three ride wheel of good fortune

Warkworth's Toby Leach (left) and Hastings' Nigel Collins.

The stars and director of Wheeler's Luck say their show is so good that if you don't laugh at least once, they'll refund your money.

Nigel Collins, Toby Leach and director Damon Andrews haven't had to shell out a cent yet and Wheeler's Luck has been touring the country for nearly a year.

The Auckland Theatre Company opens its latest season with the 80-minute comedy and the three - laugh-out-loud funny during an interview, let alone on stage - are sure everyone will love the show.

"Whether you come from a city or a small town in New Zealand, in fact you come from a small place because there are only four million people in the entire country," Leach says.

"We all know the places and characters in Wheeler's Luck because we have all been there on holiday or have met the people somewhere along the way."

Wheeler's Luck is set in Bell End, a sleepy seaside town that an Auckland developer wants to turn into a tourist mecca.

To protect their slice of paradise the townspeople are determined to make life as difficult as possible for the intruder from Auckland.

Collins and Leach portray 58 characters and recreate an entire beach horse race.

Although both have worked in Wellington for several years, they come from considerably smaller places.

Collins is from Hastings and Leach from Warkworth, where residents are fighting plans for a six-storey building - including apartments, shops and restaurants - in the town's centre.

The two did not meet until the beginning of 2004 but decided they liked each other's work enough to sit down and write a play together.

Both wanted to create their own work and tell New Zealand stories rather than appearing in plays about the other side of the world.

Discussing their home towns made them feel nostalgic - and miffed that the character of smalltown New Zealand was changing so quickly.

"Essentially, it's a story about how you hold on to the things that make your community and country unique in the face of something bigger coming along which brings with it potentially a lot of money," Leach says.

They roped in Niu Sila director Damon Andrews to help craft Wheeler's Luck, which premiered at Wellington's Bats Theatre.

It was so successful that the larger and more mainstream Circa Theatre picked it up before the boys moved to the arts festival circuit later last year

They are surprised that a show originally planned for a two-week season in a small theatre is still going strong but believe it is further proof that local theatre is coming of age.

"Wheeler's Luck is strongly promoted as a New Zealand play and in the past that may have been downplayed in the publicity, and that it is now so much a part of the marketing shows we are getting over our cultural cringe factor," Collins says.

Part of its appeal, they believe, is its length.

Writing material for a media-savvy audience regularly distracted by mobile phones, text messages, email, web browsers, free mags, broadsheets, tabloids, radio and television means having to bear in mind shortened attention spans.

They wonder if more compact theatre productions are destined to become the norm and detract from more traditional works.

ATC artistic director Colin McColl considers that good theatre should not be evaluated on its length and that it is a living art form that must adapt to reflect social and cultural change.

After all, at few hundred years ago audiences would talk during productions, shout out their opinions on the on-stage action and - if they really didn't like what they saw - throw tomatoes.

"We're not saying we want anyone to throw tomatoes. But if they don't like it there's always the money-back guarantee," Collins says.

Collins, Leach and Andrews will take Wheeler's Luck to the world later this year when, after performances in Whangarei and the Bay of Islands, they head to the Edinburgh Festival.

* Wheeler's Luck

Where and when: Maidment Theatre, Feb 16-Mar 11