Have you ever had the burning desire to see two bumbling con-men, a dysfunctional family and a water gun share the same stage? Well, if you were in the A.E Hotchner Studio Theatre over the weekend, you got to see just that on the stage in a hilarious, touching performance of “Florida.”

“Florida” is a comic play written by recent Wash. U. alumnus Lucas Marschke, workshopped this past fall as a part of the A.E Hotchner Playwriting Festival and staged this past weekend by the Performing Arts Department. The play tells the interwoven story of three groups of people all travelling to Florida for the holidays: two actors-turned-failed-kidnappers and their unsuspecting victim, a mother and her three kids navigating a tense family dynamic and their father driving with his mistress.

This production was a lot of fun. The set design for the show was striking—the crew had constructed two car skeletons and half of an RV, as well as piles of fake snow, to create a truly impressive ambiance for the piece. The first group to appear onstage, two kidnappers named Oscar (sophomore Dennis Murray) and Reg (freshman Nathaniel Holmes), who accidentally kidnapped Seth (sophomore Camden Sabathne), the roommate of their target, serve as the primary comedy of the piece. Murray and Holmes were hilarious as a pair of incompetent actors-turned-thugs, alternatingly intense and ambivalent alongside the perpetually nervous Sabathne, whose Seth remained terrified and complacent no matter how many times his kidnappers messed up the plans mandated by their elusive “boss.”

Though it’s been categorized as a road trip comedy, the play is quite well-balanced, featuring some crucial dramatic moments between jokes. The family dynamic elicited some touching, tear-jerking drama, with mother Barbara (senior Ebby Offord) trying to hold her family together for one last trip before their father, who tells his family that he is out on a business trip for the holidays, confesses to having an affair. The three kids, Pete (junior Dwayne McGowan), Maddy (freshman Sarah Willis) and Bridget (senior Carly Rosenbaum), have an all-too-familiar dynamic, with Pete, the epitome of teenage angst, clashing with his egotistical sister, Bridget, while the youngest sister, Maddy, tries her hardest to keep everyone on speaking terms and her mother sane. Rosenbaum’s Bridget becomes increasingly more nuanced and caring as her brother, Pete, inches closer to going off the rails despite the efforts of the sweet, understanding Maddy. This sibling dynamic was impressively rendered by all three actors, with Offord’s conflicted and frustrated mother character serving as the emotional touchstone of the piece.

The third and final car contains the patriarch of the family, Rudolph (sophomore Marek Rodriguez), and his sweet, considerate girlfriend, Charlotte (senior Annie Butler). Butler’s Charlotte is strikingly loveable; she is patient, funny and helpful, even alongside the temperamental Rudolph. Just as the family’s tension reaches its boiling point, Charlotte and Rudolph are shoved into the mix as they are discovered by Maddy, and Oscar takes matters into his own hands by deciding to give Pete a good scare in front of his enraged family. Finally, everyone’s secrets are out in the open, and Florida is still nowhere in sight.

I had a great time watching “Florida,” and I congratulate the Performing Arts Department on their funny, emotional and nuanced performance of a family on the brink of a breakdown and the three bozos who make absolutely sure that they tip over the edge.