"Love's Labour's Lost" publicity photo.

photo by John Haynes

If there’s one takeaway from the Globe Theatre’s production of “Love’s Labour’s Lost,” presented this week by the University Musical Society, it’s that Shakespeare comedies can, and probably should, be a rollicking good time.

For all too often, Shakespeare productions feel stiff and mothballed and dull, due to a bloated sense of reverence for the bard’s poetry. Thankfully, however, the Globe’s company has arrived to remind us that we should be laughing - and laughing hard - rather than sitting quietly with folded hands while “appreciating” the joy right out of shows like “Lost.”

One of Shakespeare’s earliest plays, “Lost” begins with Ferdinand, King of Navarre (Philip Cumbus) urging three courtiers - Berowne (Trystan Gravelle), Longaville (Will Mannering) and Dumaine (Jack Farthing) - to join him in swearing off women and other worldly pleasures for three years in order to study. They all sign an oath, but they’re immediately tested when the Princess of France (Michelle Terry) arrives with three ladies-in-waiting - Rosaline (Thomasin Rand), Maria (Jade Anouka) and Katherine (Sian Robins-Grace).

Before this energizing, three-hour production even begins, audience members see and hear a small band of musicians playing music in the lobby. (Fittingly, they don’t play quiet, quaint, Elizabethan background music, but rather raucous, drum-pounding tunes.) They make their way toward the stage, and two large deer puppets - who later play a role in the main characters' hunt - briefly interact with audience members and play out a mimed courtship, thus highlighting the comedy’s thematic focus.

And while “Lost” is considered by many to be a show that doesn’t translate easily or well for contemporary audiences, director Dominic Dromgoole and his sharp, accomplished cast make its tougher passages palatable by way of playfulness. For instance, the production’s most hysterical scene involves the four men reading their oath-breaking love letters aloud and spying upon one another. The physical comedy that plays out in the background - such as the king slowly rolling away on the ground in order to sneak away, and Longaville sitting on an audience member’s lap in hopes of “blending in” - is priceless and keeps the audience from getting bogged down in the men’s syrupy expressions of love.

And Dromgoole wholly embraces the show’s implied bawdiness rather than just naughtily flirting with it. “Lost” features fart jokes, phallic jokes, an extremely lusty couple, and a food fight. But then this is part of the reason it’s such a good time.

Sian Williams’ choreography, paired with Claire van Kampen’s music, makes scenes like the beginning of the hunt exciting, and Jonathan Fensom’s costumes manage to look gorgeously lush while also allowing the actors to move quickly and freely (a necessity in comedy).

The cast is outstanding, save for the slight disappointment of Rand, who doesn’t quite project Rosaline’s wisecracking confidence and alpha-femaleness (and thus makes her a weak foil for Gravelle’s wonderful Berowne). Plus, a few isolated moments in "Lost" are played in a way that feels just a hair too big for the Power Center’s space.

Of course, Dromgoole originally tailored this production for London’s Globe Theatre, where hundreds of patrons either stand or sit on hard, wooden benches, in the round, in order to replicate the experience of Shakespeare’s original audiences. To transfer the show to a more conventionally contemporary space, Dromgoole keeps the house lights up throughout the show and has actors use the aisles for several entrances and exits.

The effect breaks down some of the barriers between performers and audience - which is a particularly good thing when the actors seem to be having such a contagiously good time.

Jenn McKee is the entertainment digital journalist for AnnArbor.com. Reach her at jennmckee@annarbor.com or 734-623-2546, and follow her on Twitter @jennmckee.