STAGE REVIEW : Battling for the Soul of Rock ‘n’ Roll

On its surface, Denis Spedaliere’s “Vicious” couldn’t appear less consequential. As a look at rock ‘n’ roll druggies, it seems like the Anatomy of a Withdrawal. As a portrait of arguably the most notorious bassist in rock ‘n’ roll history, Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols, it seems to lack the potential Orton-like farce that the Pistols’ world would demand.

But Spedaliere is interested in what happened to Sid after Johnny Rotten single-handedly decided to deep-six the band, after Sid fled to New York once England virtually banished him, after Sid joined up with Philadelphia punk fan and “manager” Nancy Spungen and tried to get a solo career going. And after, long after, Sid and Nancy had shot so much heroin in their veins that they resembled a pair of bobbing spring dolls more than people.

So “Vicious,” at the Complex in Hollywood, shows us two zonked-out kids reeling in their trashed Chelsea Hotel room in 1978.

So?

Well, even in a state of profound chemical haze, Spedaliere’s Sid manages to take a stand in what evolves into a battle for rock ‘n’ roll’s soul. “Vicious” is not only one of theater’s more unrelenting depictions of junkies losing their grip, but a classic dialectic of rock passion and rock biz.

Spedaliere leaves no doubt which side wins, and his tragic, bloody end culminates a charged fable on rock’s dark marriage to death, from Buddy Holly to John Lennon. He has embellished the facts--Nancy (Mindy Clarke, alternating with Ginger Lynn Allen) is murdered, and Sid (Ernie Mirich) is the key suspect--with a scenario that includes Nick (Patrick St. Esprit), a corporate type ready to take over Sid’s career from Nancy, and Champ (Scott Disharoon), a hustling dealer.

It makes for simple, elegant dramatic geometry. Sid is torn between his genuine love for and loyalty to Nancy (and the punk rebellion against the pop music Establishment they both try to embody) and his need to line up a really solid tour, which is what Nick can deliver--if Sid cleans up. But Champ, like some kind of Edenic snake, is there with the promise of the Next High, which is a lot quicker than a bunch of dates in the States and Japan.

Champ and Nick are two sides of the business world squeezing the juice out of the artists; the audience, thanks to the relentless pace director Dorothy Lyman (reprising her 1984 staging) adroitly imposes on the play, feels the squeeze too: there’s an unnerving exuberance to this discomforting show, like being in a room with a gunman with an itchy trigger finger.

Mirich looks, sounds and feels like Sid to a scarifying degree, down to the slightly ravaged, thinned-out torso, and St. Esprit cuts the perfect opposite figure--the assured Mr. Control in double-breasted duds who knows a pop phenom when he sees one. Disharoon nicely underplays a guy who loves talking business. But Clarke overplays her essentially two-note performance, either indignant or stoned, with none of the lost innocence that Chloe Webb, for instance, brought to her screen role in “Sid and Nancy.” Even so, “Vicious” sends you out shaking.

* “Vicious,” The Complex, 6472 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood, Fridays, 8 p.m.; Saturdays, 7 and 10 p.m.; Sundays, 8 p.m. Ends July 27. (213) 464-2124 or (213) 660-8587. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.