Literal dirty politics at their funniest

Thanks to the scandals engendered by certain sleazy politicians, the previously innocuous phrases “wide stance” and “hiking the Appalachian Trail” have taken on a decidedly sordid connotation. Hilariously exploiting the faux pas of such real-life politicos as former Idaho Senator Larry Craig, former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, former Florida Representative Mark Foley and the unfortunately named Anthony Weiner, Tail! Spin! hoists its subjects on their own verbal petards. Previously seen a couple of years back at the New York International Fringe Festival, the show has now returned for a commercial Off-Broadway engagement with several of its original performers, including the priceless Rachel Dratch of Saturday Night Live fame. It was created by Mario Correa, a former congressional aide and lobbyist who clearly knows the territory well. The piece is wittily staged by Dan Knechtges; it consists entirely of actual e-mails, text messages, IMs, press conferences, tweets and interviews, edited and presented for maximum comic effect. Thus we see Craig (Sean Dugan) haplessly explaining, “I’m a fairly wide guy,” about his infamous wandering foot incident in a Minneapolis airport bathroom stall, as his wife (Dratch) comments, “I asked myself if I missed something somewhere.”