SEARCHING FOR A PUCKER IN ‘BABY WANT A KISS’

There was an imp running around loose inside the head of James Costigan when he wrote “Baby Want a Kiss” for Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward in 1964.

How else do we explain why Costigan never allows Edward, to whom our sympathies are drawn, a chance to free himself from the thrall of his neurotic Hollywood friends? Or why this absurdist-leaning play violates even the marginal dramatic rules of the Theatre of the Absurd? Or why we walk out of the Burbank On Stage Theatre feeling that Costigan’s played a meaningless trick on us, like Edward’s pals?

The initial setup seems straightforward enough. Mavis and Emil (Terri Treas and Josh Taylor), Hollywood megastars on vacation, get word that their old comrade Edward (Joseph Gallison) is living nearby. How about popping by for a visit? At first, Edward looks like the strange one, with his excessively rich interior design stew of baroque, Italianate and macho medieval (Ken Knight did the very respectable set). He even boasts of the history of his knickknacks, such as a Pygmy bowl once owned by W. H. Hudson or a glass case that used to belong to Malthus. We wonder about Edward.

In no time, though, Mavis and Emil far outdistance him in the who’s-a-bigger-kook sweepstakes.

With no irony, Mavis says she would prefer being viewed as royalty than just an immortal screen actress. Emil informs Edward that they’re vegetarians. What, Edward demands, is he to do about the roast he’s baking for the three of them? We’ll eat it of course, Emil responds, as if Edward’s concern is uncalled for. We’re theoretical vegetarians, you see.

And so it goes. Costigan at least lets Edward reveal why their friendship stopped so many years ago: Mavis and Emil made too many demands on him. And so they do now. They behave like a crazy Lewis Carroll couple, turning their outrageousness into normalcy, and their counterpart’s normalcy into outrageousness.

It’s a risky design for drama--either you generate a moral out of this, or just illogic and frustration. With Costigan letting Edward passively permit these two to do whatever they please, his play becomes a pat case of a spineless foil being bent out of shape for no discernible reason. Absurdism follows the beat of the dark human heart. “Baby Want a Kiss” has no beat, and no real heart.

Gallison, Treas and Taylor do keep up a fairly rigorous pace under Dean Brooks’ direction, especially with a script heavy with words, if not ideas. Treas is particularly energizing as a woman who’s probably an undiagnosed schizophrenic. Fortunately, she doesn’t play her that way.

Performances at 139 N. Golden Mall, Burbank, are Thursdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m. until May 11 ((818) 842-1072).

‘IN CIRCLES’

Thirty minutes or so into John Sowie’s staging of Gertrude Stein’s and Al Carmines’ musical, “In Circles,” at the Olio, I scribbled a note: “Where is this going?”

In circles, true to the title. A circle of friends sing about their lives (around the time of World War I), their loves, their likes. Especially, though, they sing about circles, or if not literally circles, about how everything is like a circle. In a sense.

This may sound like suspiciously little, and, as Stein might say, it is it is it is. Stein at her best was a humorous manipulator of language, tickling the outer syntactical regions of English with the incessant but soft stroke of a feather. In this respect, her style can be gentle and a welcome alternative to masculine ways of writing. At her worst--and it’s on display here--she was an egotistical stylist, having no regard for how her creations struck readers or listeners.

How long, for example, can one listen to Carri Patterson’s Jessie chant the words, “Cut wood,” until one wants to shout out, “Cut”?

Perhaps “In Circles” is best read; but, then, why perform it at all? For Carmines’ music, certainly, which is rich, scintillatingly harmonic and deftly haunting. Sowie’s cast may play characters with names like Mildred, Sylvia and Ollie, but they’re really voices singing finely conceived music. Stephen Schmidt, Noelle McGrath , Patterson, and Kathryn Laird-Johnson reveal monumental vocal talents that overshadow this doodling of a play.

To be fair, this was not meant as a play, in any sense. The intent was a defiantly female view of life, opposing oppressive linearity with the nurturing circle. But rather than nurture this concept into a work that plays , Stein and Carmines tax our spirit and patience.

A note for the record: This production incorrectly claims that it is the “long overdue Los Angeles premiere.” In fact, the L.A. (professional, not student) premiere was in mid-July, 1969, at UCLA.

Performances at 3709 Sunset Blvd., run Thursdays through Saturdays, 8:30 p.m., until May 10 (666-9121 or 667-9556).

‘STARSHIP SHAKESPEARE’

Our contemporary destruction of Shakespeare keeps apace of our contemporary exalting of him. For every Des McAnuff or Ian McKellen, there is a “Starship Shakespeare,” doing a Hulk Hogan number on iambic pentameter.

Indeed, the real inspiration for Ben Donenberg’s clumsy parody, newly moved to the Powerhouse, is feverish viewings of “Star Treks” and “Star Wars.” Donenberg has placed such Shakespeare luminaries as Lady Macbeth (Dianne Zapanta), King Lear (Bill Burns) and Hamlet (Jay Spears) in a space ship, with each vying for command. So Donenberg gets to roll out a lot of science-fiction jokes to spice up his warped verse (Othello, giving his American Express card to Prospero: “Don’t beam down without it!”).

Of course, the idea of bringing major Shakespearean creations together with the conceit of a battle for power is a good one, and follows naturally from so many of his plots. But the parodist must know and respect the parodied; neither is evident here. Worse, Paul Mackley’s cast, with the exception of Duane Daniels as Bottom (though not as an unfunny Othello), emote with all the skill of high schoolers on a romp. The uncredited set, full of aluminum foil, looks high schoolish too. Like the project, it even lacks the charm of camp.

Performances are at 3116 2nd St. in Santa Monica, Thursdays through Saturdays, 8:30 p.m.; Sundays, 3 p.m., indefinitely.