TEMPTING VIEWS IN ‘EARLY TENNESSEE’

Quintessential Tennessee Williams, made even more delectable by the selection of four rarely staged one-acts, is on view at the Powerhouse in Santa Monica.

Entitled “Early Tennessee,” the one-acts stretch from the ‘30s to the ‘50s and are fascinating glimpses into the themes that earmarked Williams’ full-length plays. Director Dan Mason’s sensibility is like a tuning fork, perfectly capturing Williams’ lyricism, psychological insights and hothouse theatricality. The casting and acting are astute, and production values sparingly render the playwright’s tonal signature. The production is a must-see for fans of Williams.

“Auto-Da-Fe” (1941) finds an agitated, aesthetic young man (Michael Slater) confronting the banalities of his mother (Lynne Arden) as they sit in faded wicker chairs on a front porch in Vieux Carre. The son’s inchoate homosexual desire/revulsion and the mother’s obtuseness are richly drawn.

“Mooney’s Kid Don’t Cry” (1934, among Williams’ earliest produced plays) is kitchen-sink stuff about an ill-fated young couple (Jim Christensen’s loggerhead dreamer and Dyanne Di Rosario’s dime store shrew). As they slug their way through a tattered Yuletide morning, Christensen strongly registers an early version of Tom Wingfield in “The Glass Menagerie.”

Di Rosario, who turns mindless toenail painting into a telling sexual image, foreshadows a much later social climate when she saucily splits to find her own dreams, leaving her big tender lug with the baby.

Actress Lynne Arden reappears as an imperious Southern Daughter of the Confederacy in “Something Unspoken” (1950), an evanescent work that bristles with things unsaid in a not-so-casual afternoon between the dowager and her personal live-in secretary (played with tremulous fragility by Karen Wright-Hoffman). The homosexual subtext, considerably more subtle than in the decade-earlier “Auto-Da-Fe,” is impressively modulated by the two actresses.

The closer, “Talk to Me Like the Rain and Let Me Listen” (1953) sustains the subject of two people living together who can’t communicate, in this case a husband and wife (Richard Millet and Leslie Paxton). They are clearly a generation and several entombments down the road from the marital despair of the Depression saga “Mooney’s Kid Don’t Cry.”

Williams’ writing here is burnished. The drunken, pleading Millet and the evocative and numbed Paxton, whose wishful, vanishing dreamscape is conveyed with irresistible and deadly allure, reaffirm the evening’s riches.

Performances at 3116 2nd St., Santa Monica, are Thursdays through Sundays, 8 p.m., through Oct. 11 (213) 392-6529.

‘JOAQUIN MURRIETA’

California’s romantic outlaw, the Mexican folk hero Joaquin Murrieta, is merely the hook of a fable on which to hang some flashy Latino musical talent.

That’s OK. Teatro Urbano is up front about wanting to put on a show, not a musical drama about Murrieta (who is performed with flare and dashing good looks by Tomos Goros). The production strongly benefits from its venue, the Troubadour.

The club’s wooded spaciousness is perfect for this florid production. With drinking during the show (the club asks a two-drink minimum), the experience isn’t riveting but it is a nominal hoot.

Producer Rosemary Soto and director Rene Rodriguez, with music and lyrics by Ronald Catano and book by Alejandro Nandyelli, smartly keep the rambling, two-act proceedings to about 70 minutes of playing time.

Alexandra Liccet as Murrieta’s vixen mistress and Goros’ ill-fated hero are strong singers and vivid performers. The talent drops sharply thereafter. The 14 songs are serviceable and the tone, from camp to melodrama, decidedly mixed.

Performances at 9081 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood, are at 3 p.m. Sundays and are extended through Oct. 26 (213) 227-8839.

‘INDECENT ACTS’

On occasion, an actor will light up what is otherwise fairly ordinary material. Such is the case with actor Barry Theiler in the dual “Indecent Acts,” which serve as an earnest maiden venture for Feathered Friends Productions at the McCadden Place Theater.

Playwright Jerry Fey and director Gino Conforti have woven two one-acts that are sufficiently taut amd psychologically credible to suggest promising work.

But it is Theiler’s embattled, grieving widower in “The Dance” and his nail-hard and deceptively vicious prison guard in “Lemon Cheese” that leave you remembering the actor more than the plays. Theiler’s tension appears to be effortlessly delivered.

The tour de force role in “Lemon Cheese” belongs to Nick Hardin as a demented killer awaiting execution. Hardin is properly psychotic and even conveys a touch of jocular charm. Lia Sargent and Doug Burch supply able support in the respective but certainly not “indecent” acts. The title seems a promotional come-on. Production values are skimpy.

Performances at 1157 N. McCadden Place, Hollywood, are Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 7 p.m., through Oct. 12 (213) 662-8245.

‘CITY SOLITAIRE’

The title, which stands for urban loneliness, is superior to the plays (a pair of one-acts). But the material, at the Flight Theater, doesn’t take itself too seriously and has its moments.

“Landscape with Waitress,” written by Robert Pine and directed by Peter Kiwitt, features John Couch as a lone diner whose lustful thoughts ands fantasies about the waitress serving him are openly dramatized for the benefit of the audience. Couch enjoys a certain kind of W. C. Fields’ mien, and Lolita Fatjo’s waitress parlays silent efficiency into a workable foil. But the gimmick wears out before the play does.

Dating services are rendered charlatans in “Introductions Incorporated,” rather stiffly directed by Gary Brockette and predictably written by Ed Solomon. Arlee Reed is credibly insecure as a desperately forlorn young man who storms a dating office full of wondrous hope only to wind up with a rotten computer date. He returns to the service and violently, haplessly throws himself on an impersonal blonde receptionist with great legs (Cana Cockrell). The blowup is signaled from Reed’s first entrance but Reed manages to touch a truthful core. Danny Proctor is the phony office boss.

The productions are light stuff; at least they don’t make you feel lonely.

Performances at 6476 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood, are Fridays through Sundays, 8 p.m., through Oct. 12 (213) 871-8048.