STAGE REVIEW : The Mythic Madness of Michael Sargent’s ‘I Hate!’

Playwright Michael Sargent is developing a mythic anti-hero for the ‘90s. The protagonist of “I Hate!” at the Cast Theatre is certainly a further blossoming of the central figure in Sargent’s “Big Boy,” presented by John Steppling’s and Bob Glaudini’s Heliogabalus company a couple of seasons ago at the Cast (Sargent emerged from Steppling’s workshop).

Sargent’s mythic hero is young, monolithic, oblivious to the outside forces which shape his life, and revels in a state of undress which comments wryly on his intellectual impact on society.

In “I Hate!” the blank-eyed figure is again, like Boy in the previous play, passively engaged in a way of life that eventually ends in self-destruction. After his three years in prison, his vindictive mother kicks him out of her home, and he rents a cheap room in the faded mansion of a faded silent screen star.

Sargent’s unfailing sense of humor has taken a glance at “Sunset Boulevard” for the set-up, along with a long look at “Sweet Bird of Youth” (the boy’s name is Chance). The difference is that the faded star is Sanchez, Latin lover rival of Valentino. Sanchez, who claims Ramon Navarro was weird, wears a flimsy Oriental dress and is never without his parasol. And he’s never without a hungry leer when Chance is within grabbing range.

Maud, a drunken barfly, is the derelict Chance passes off as a nurse to help baby-sit Sanchez. She completes the unholy triumvirate as it spins itself into disaster.

The wicked humor Sargent displayed in “Big Boy” is evident here. If the production isn’t as striking as its predecessor, it might be because the playwright directed this one himself, while “Big Boy” was guided by Lee Kissman. Kissman is present in a subtle, quirky performance as Sanchez but the wit and originality in his staging of the earlier play is missing. Director Sargent takes playwright Sargent a little too seriously.

But playwright Sargent has hit on something with his mythic character (played properly by Jason Reed like a puppy stunned at his first spanking for missing the papers). Chance is as strong a comment on the disenfranchised young male of the ‘90s as Sam Shepard’s comic book pseudo cowboy was of the ‘60s. It’s a kinky, unsettling image.

Shawna Casey is also a little unsettling as sleazy Maud. She captures the thoughtless evil of the character without totally giving away her game too quickly. Tina Preston, who can make the most outlandish characterization seem perfectly normal, does so as both Chance’s mother and Maud’s mother.

Courtenay Marvin’s set and costumes and Don Preston’s 1940s-tuned sound design blend in perfectly with the “Sunset Boulevard” ambience and have some of the humor of the writing. Sargent’s mythic hero deserves more of that humor in the playwright’s direction.

At 800 N. El Centro Ave., Hollywood; Thursdays and Fridays,8 p.m.; ends March 9. Tickets: $5; (213) 462-0265.