Stage : Gentle Clown’s Sweet Laughs

There is a moment in “Avner the Eccentric” at the Westwood Playhouse when Avner performs a daring feat over the heads of three tiny tots he has carefully selected from the audience.

Two things about it were notable at the performance attended: the unquestioning trust these little ones seemed to have in this tall gangly stranger with a bright-red nose like Rudolph--and the trust displayed by their parents.

No tears, no reaching out for the sanctuary of Mommy’s arms. Shyness, yes, but no reluctance to go with Avner. In 90 minutes of understated, witty shenanigans, this instance provided the best credential for Avner Eisenberg--clown, juggler, mime, sly deceiver and cunning conjurer.

He does have other not-too-shabby credentials also. He studied with master mimes Jacques LeCoq in Paris and Carlo Mazzone-Clementi in Blue Lake, Calif. (Mazzone-Clementi is the guru of the Dell’Arte Company, currently visiting at Theatre West with a show called “Slapstick.”) But his best credential of all may be time spent working the streets, where you learn how to work the people.

In this regard, Avner--it doesn’t do to call him Eisenberg--joins the ranks of such clown-savants as Bill Irwin and David Shiner, seen for the first time here when Canada’s Le Cirque Du Soleil pitched its “Nouvelle Experience” on Santa Monica beach last October.

They are master clowns who have conquered far more than the art of making people laugh with pratfalls. They defy gravity (pun intended) and make people laugh with seemingly innocent mischief as intricate as a mathematical theorem. This is serious funny stuff.

Avner begins by waiting for the show to begin. Deception is the name of the game. He sweeps the stage, dawdles, smokes a cigarette. Well, he tries to smoke a cigarette. Things kinda get in the way. They spill, drop, fall apart, move out of range. Latecomers provide a distraction--a window of clowning opportunity.

Later Avner juggles, balances unlikely objects on his chin (including a double sheet of newsprint), becomes a human fountain on the strength of a small sip of water, and performs other conjuring acts--including an encore--that can be categorized as tricks.

Good, wowing, familiar, cleverly executed, but still tricks.

This is not a put-down, but it doesn’t do to reconstruct too much of Avner’s act on paper. For one thing, by its very nature it is subject to permutations. For another, more important, what he does matters less than how he does it, particularly his skill at deliciously manipulating and focusing his audience and keeping it where he wants it. Watch him orchestrate applause-alongs and whistle-alongs and stomping-alongs with various sections of his audience. Talk about working a room!

Kids aren’t the only individuals he invites, cajoles or coerces on to the stage. Much like Shiner, he peruses and weighs the field like a good produce peddler before making his moves. He may be eccentric, but he’s a gentle, spontaneous eccentric, with a sharp eye and a mind quick to assess its best chances in a sea of strangers. He knows how to pick his people, loosen them up and reassure them.

In the end, this is a wise and a satisfying experience filled with sweetness and laughter in about equal measure, which makes it, not so coincidentally, also a super show for children 3 years old and older.