COMEDY REVIEW : Shore Brings His Folksiness to Santa Monica

Sammy Shore is a veteran Las Vegas stand-up comedian whose life and times are warmed over in “Sammy Shore, On Stage and Off,” written by his longtime friend Rudy DeLuca, at the Santa Monica Playhouse.

Shore is an amiable, folksy performer who fits well in the little playhouse, which has served the local community in the manner of a theatrical mom-and-pop shop (the lobby is crammed with self-promotional materials and stage memorabilia). The night that this reviewer was on hand, the audience seemed roundly appreciative of Shore’s notes on aging and his mock-indignity in recounting a career as a warm-up comic for the likes of Julio Iglesias and Elvis Presley (“You’re gonna hear the best of all time, but first--Sammy Shore!”).

Shore’s routine owes a heavy debt to the Jewish Borscht Belt tradition, which has been milked beyond the grave. Comedy is one of the most unforgiving of metiers in that those who don’t rise to the level of classical style, like Johnny Carson and Bob Hope, are condemned to an irreversible staleness. Some of Shore’s one-liners score (on recommending a water bed for geriatric love-making: “One good push gets you through the whole thing”). Others seem forced (he talks of his metal hip implants and how they stick to the magnets on his girl friend’s refrigerator). And still others sound as though they cry for the kaboom of a drummer’s rim shot (on attending a tough Chicago high school: “Most schools turned out doctors, lawyers. We turned out patients”).

Shore is not a sharp impressionist, his timing is slow and methodical, and he never knows when to quit (we don’t need five minutes of hacking and wretching to get the picture of a girlfriend who smokes)--a strategic oversight that could easily be remedied if director Chris DeCarlo were less indulgent. The repartee between Shore and tuxedoed piano accompanist Reginald Powell is strained because Powell, who is supposed to represent a snooty and self-infatuated Anglican aesthete repelled by this low comedian, is soggy where he should be dry.

Shore is nothing if not pleasant, but a lifetime of bland pumping us up in anticipation of seeing other people has taken its toll. It’s hard to be the life of the party after taking everyone’s coat at the door.

Performances Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 7 p.m., through June 26, at 1211 Fourth St., Santa Monica (213) 394-9779.