TWO ORIGINALS AT PASADENA PLAYHOUSE : FUN WITH DICK AND DALE

Dale Gonyea is one of the few male performers around who can get away with being winsome without putting your teeth on edge. Dick Shawn has made a comedy career of puzzling the apocalyptic--past, present and future. Together they make up an entertainment at the Pasadena Playhouse called “In Concert, Dick Shawn and Dale Gonyea.”

If the title and the noun entertainment are less than inspiring, so be it. There’s an art to everything, and Gonyea and Shawn not only do what they do surpassingly well, they’re originals. So what if any after-impression of their act evaporates the minute you hit the night air (though I’ll remember the curious way the disembodied head of Shawn, perched on a restaurant table, peers at a man who sits in front of him with a bowl of soup). At least part of your burdensome day will evaporate too when they come on.

Both are essentially club performers who have adapted to the stage (Shawn had a long-running success a couple of seasons back with his “The (2nd) Greatest Entertainer in the Whole Wide World”--a large part of which is resurrected here).

If you’re familiar with Gonyea, you know that his act is based on original songs, such as “My Dad Could Beat Up Your Dad, but Wouldn’t,” and personable chat. His material is more novel than trenchant (one of his songs is titled “Let’s Put Our Hands Across Shelley Winters” in the manner of a Live Aid parody). But he’s an adroit lyricist (a number called “Least Favorite Things” includes “Buying new shoes that give you blisters/Calling the sex line and the voice is your sister’s”); he’s alert to the moment--a paper toilet seat shield on his piano bench says a lot about our AIDS-induced sexual anxiety without a further word, and his act is impeccably paced. He’s also a good pianist. His comic opera “The Red Gloves,” a sendup of “The Red Shoes,” isn’t much, but he whisks it away before we notice.

For anyone who hasn’t seen him before, Shawn is a revelation. For those of us who have, it’s a little disappointing to see him continuously show up with the same kit. There’s one startling addition (at least for this viewer): that talking head, as though John the Baptist wasn’t going to let a bit of bad business at court keep him from a night out. Imagine what consternation he gives his family, who can never think of anything to give him on his birthday except yet another unwelcome hat.

Unlike many stand-ups, Shawn knows how to take a stage. His movement is graceful and fluid. He uses a softly wondrous tone of voice to sweep us into a mood of magical appreciation of what he’s saying. And he always gives the impression that he’s saying something at the exact moment he thought of it. He doesn’t need many jokes, therefore; he has the fine actor’s ability to take an audience into his confidence, or at least his rhythm.

Example: “The Pasadena Playhouse is tradition. Gregory Peck stood on this very stage. He learned how to act here. Robert Redford stood on this stage. He learned how to act here. George Hamilton. . . . “ Shawn paused. He pulled the audience into a laugh without saying another word.

Evolution, the tough job of being God (“He had two beautiful children in Adam and Eve, who looked like Donny and Marie Osmond. But they had two children who looked like John DeLorean and Claus von Bulow”) and the United World of America (with an extant Israel of course, for a place to buy wholesale) are again launching points for his gently lunatic excursions into the Meaning of It All. But to hear the theme “Hail to the Audience,” which opened his old show, close this one, is to think, “This is where we came in.”

The fine lighting and sound design for both performers are uncredited, as is the silently funny man with the soup bowl.

Performances tonight and Friday, 8 p.m.; Saturday 5 and 9 p.m.; Sunday, 2 and 7 p.m. at 39 S. El Molino Ave., Pasadena, (818) 356-PLAY. Ends Sunday.