AT STAGES : PAVLOVSKY’S REQUIEM FOR A BOXER

If there is a political metaphor buried in “Camaralenta/Slowmotion,” the third play by Eduardo Pavlovsky to open at Stages in as many weeks (and the only one spoken in English), it is not of enormous consequence to the immediate action on stage.

Putting it another way, this requiem for yet another heavyweight gains its distinction from the solemnity with which it minutely and methodically--blow by blow?--observes a former boxing champion’s mental and physical collapse. In the moment, it is the mesmerizing semi-torpor of the writing (itself a reflection of the stasis of the bludgeoned champ) and the exquisite refinement of the acting that we celebrate.

Paul Verdier, who directed and did the excellent translation, has assembled a first-class company consisting of Grace Zabriskie and Hal Bokar (reunited for the first time since “L’Amante Anglaise”) and the exemplary Tony Abatemarco as the ex-fighter, Dagomar.

In contrast to the first two plays that launched Stages’ ongoing PAVLOVSKYfest (the Spanish-language “Pablo” and “Potestad,” in which the political content was integral and the innuendos much more accessible), any political metaphor in “Camaralenta” has to be superimposed: Argentina as an abused, knocked-about wreck, carrying around socially irredeemable stigmata. But this knowledge neither enhances nor impairs an apolitical enjoyment of the piece as a baleful study of the down and out.

The quality of the writing (reminiscent in its tone of Beckett, in its bleakness of some of the new wave Americans such as John Steppling and the Padua Hills Festival playwrights) lies in its focus on diurnal minutiae. The slow motion of the title is not idle. The play’s tempo is deliberately that. Everything moves like the molasses in Dagomar’s brain.

Pavlovsky (a remarkable Argentine actor, psychiatrist and playwright who should have been part of our theatrical consciousness long before now) has structured his play with the repetitiveness of new music. He gives us the stillness of sorrow as the immovable corners of a triangle: the ex-fighter; Amilcar (Bokar), his trainer and self-appointed caretaker--and Rosa (Zabriskie), the neighborly prostitute who drops in now and then to “relax” Dagomar’s tensions by letting him stare at her feet.

There is no other action.

Circular conversations fill time and the empty air. Small quarrels occur. Non-games are played with the seriousness of real engagements. Reminiscence comes and goes. Details of the past are insistently examined and re-examined. This universe is as endless and hermetic as a season in hell.

Through it all, there is one movement: Dagomar’s senses diminish--imperceptibly at first, then faster, until he loses control of his wandering mind and his bodily functions and sinks with the pathetic weight of human shrapnel.

End of play.

It is as much through broken images and rhythms as through language that Pavlovsky delivers this portrait, impeccably mounted in English at Stages. (Ken Booth produced and also did the intentionally depressed lighting.)

Yet there is a part of this reviewer that misses the urgency of the later, more overtly political plays. Or does it have something to do with missing the exotic rhythms of the original Spanish--and Pavlovsky’s uncommonly charismatic presence on stage (he performed in both)? “Camaralenta” was written in 1979, “Potestad” in ’85 and “Pablo” just this year. The development is almost palpable--from the concealed politics of the early play (when repressive conditions in Argentina were extreme) to the more liberated assaults in the later pieces.

In any case, one has to be profoundly grateful to Stages and Verdier (an Argentine by birth) for providing a three-pronged encounter with this major South American artist, and the opportunity to become so intimately--and suddenly--acquainted with not one play but a whole range of his work. It is no mean feat for any theater, outstanding for Equity Waiver.

Performances at 1540 N. McCadden Place run Thursdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays 2:30 and 7 p.m., indefinitely. Tickets: $12-$14 (213-465-1010).