THEATER : Safely Traditional ‘Romeo and Juliet’ : Thoughts of what might have been overshadow the La Habra Community Theatre production.

The fact that director Marla Gam-Hudson was barred from casting a black actor as Romeo in the La Habra Community Theatre’s “Romeo and Juliet” will remain the pressing element as the production closes its run this Saturday.

Gam-Hudson said she wanted the interracial casting as a way to comment on bigotry. To give further resonance, the director was considering moving Shakespeare’s tragedy of doomed love from Verona, Italy, to modern South Africa. Intriguing.

But the company’s board of directors vetoed her, claiming that a black Romeo and a white Juliet would be too controversial for the troupe’s regular subscribers and that such an approach would subvert their desire for a more traditional staging of the drama. Faint hearts and worried minds never did much for the evolution of art.

We’ll never know whether the original concept would have inspired the kind of hand-wringing protests over expressionistic license that have become almost commonplace in Orange County. Nor will we know if it would have been a bad directorial move on a purely objective level.

And there’s the rub. Besides stripping Gam-Hudson of her artistic autonomy, the board, by its preemptive action, removed the public from the process, dismantling its right to make its own judgment on the production’s validity.

In the face of this, the board’s defense--that it was protecting theatergoers and preserving the play’s integrity--is weak. Besides, Gam-Hudson wasn’t talking about an aggressively provocative or pornographic approach that would test the community’s values. She was talking about an interracial relationship, a common enough reality in our lives.

Two white actors (Christopher Lance Walker and Christian Leffler play on alternating days) were finally cast opposite Stefane Zamorano’s Juliet. It’s unfortunate that both men have faced their role under this cloud, but apparently they are holding up. Leffler got good reviews from local newspapers, and Walker, who was in the Saturday show I saw, did reasonably well despite some missteps.

Within the traditional framework, Gam-Hudson has chosen to emphasize the youthful vivacity of her lovers over their romantic longings. Walker hews to this approach closely--his Romeo is full of puppy love and percolating hormones for his Juliet.

Although all of Walker’s adolescent bopping about (this is a swain who can’t keep still) can divert one from the play’s drama, he does come across like a kid completely lost to his emotions.

That creates some tension, both erotic and comic, between him and Zamorano, who presents a Juliet with a rapidly rising temperature. Zamorano has fun with the role; her Juliet is a sensualist--she almost writhes in anticipation during the famous balcony scene.

To be sure, neither Zamorano nor Walker offers fully shaded performances, but they are the production’s best. The downside here is that Gam-Hudson’s pacing is erratic, as are most of the other portrayals.

Shakespeare places demands on community theaters that other writers don’t--from the simple handling of arcane, poetic language to the depth of his universal characters--and the stress is evident.

Still, besides Zamorano and Walker, there are other pluses, like Rand L. Hudson’s revolving set, a rather complicated and accomplished design by community theater standards. I wonder how he would have handled the challenge of a South African locale.

‘ROMEO AND JULIET’

A La Habra Community Theatre production of William Shakespeare’s tragedy. Directed by Marla Gam-Hudson. With Stefane Zamorano, Christopher Lance Walker, Christian Leffler, Larry Tonsick, Ron Graham, Richard Wakefield, Rowland Kerr, Jean Blackwood, Karan Founds, Steven Opyrchal, Eric Marx, A.K. Subramanian, Meg Gilbert, Mike Geurin, William Cole, Bob May, Tom Royer, Joseph Hall, Christy Arman, Kristen Furrer and Stephen Reifenstein. Set by Rand L. Hudson. Costumes by Caryl Peterson. Lighting by Chris Kortum. Plays Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. at the La Habra Depot Playhouse, 311 S. Euclid St. Tickets: $6 and $8. Information: (213) 905-9708.