STAGE REVIEW : New World Disorder

Twice promised and twice postponed, Alan Ayckbourn’s comedy “Henceforward . . . ,” set in an unsavory future that feels like it’s just around the corner, finally made it to town--not at the Doolittle Theatre, which was its original destination, but at the Mark Taper Forum.

This is more significant than one might think. A good deal of the “sometime quite soon” in which “Henceforward . . .” happens is also defined by the some where . This some where turns out to be the interior of composer Jerome’s apartment studio, located in the hell zone of some major city.

So brutal is it that the area has been abandoned even by police. A marauding gang of female Godzillas is out there terrorizing the neighborhood. What were formerly windows in Jerome’s apartment have had their metal shutters welded shut. His front door, under TV surveillance from within, is like the entrance to a field command post. Some pervasive sense of claustrophobia is in order--and harder to achieve on the Taper’s thrust stage, open on three sides.

Jerome’s apartment is more spacious here than it should be (it was more cluttered and menacing in the London version), but designer Ralph Funicello has created an admirable floor-to-ceiling stronghold of state-of-the-art electronics, where reel-to-reel tape recorders, keyboards, consoles and monitors constitute Jerome’s psychologically hermetic world.

That is Ayckbourn’s point, because “Henceforward . . .” (which had its American premiere in Houston in 1987 with Ayckbourn directing) examines the bunker mentality that can distance the artist from real life. Jerome (played as a proper paradox with a sense of caring alienation by John Glover) is divorced. Like some mad scientist, he lives alone with the instruments of his music and a robot named Nan 300F--a discontinued model, donated by the inventor down the hall when he moved out. Nan malfunctions all the time, but she’s company. And unlike a wife, she can be turned off.

Jerome’s problem of the moment is regaining the right to visit with his 13-year-old daughter who’s been living with her mother. In the four years since he’s been allowed to see the girl, Jerome’s muse has dried up. But now ex-wife Corinna (Paula Wilcox, prim, glamorous and cutting) has indicated she might relent. She’s coming to inspect the premises with Mervyn, an official from Child Welfare (a loping Dakin Matthews, deliciously corseted and smarmy).

What’s Jerome to do? Make a good impression. He tries to rent a fiancee for a day. Zoe (Jane Krakowski), the actress-turned-escort who shows up from the agency and has a calamitous run-in with the street gang coming in, nearly fills the bill. But in the end, she’s the inspiration for a much more devilish--and amusing--ruse.

Known for the inventiveness of his gimmicks, and never limited by them, Ayckbourn turns the second half of “Henceforward . . .” into a hilarious comedy of morals as surprising for us as it is for Jerome. Corinna, his stern bank manager ex-wife, is not quite what we expect. Neither is the reconfigurated Nan 300F, and neither is daughter Geain, pronounced Jane. (“Is it Gaelic?” asks Zoe. “No, just pretentious.”)

Director Tom Moore understands this play’s dynamics and the fact that if Ayckbourn’s point is not all that original, the way he presents it is. Ayckbourn reveals the humanity in machines and its awful breakdown in people. Mervyn can’t help, Geain (a thankless role nicely done by Ellen Idelson) can’t relate, Corinna can’t cope and Jerome can’t love. Love is the key.

In Jerome’s electronic world--and, by extension, ours--machines are easier to deal with. His telephone answering machine has a video monitor on which a friend, played apoplectically by Low Moan Spectacular’s Alan Shearman, shows up repeatedly in ever-worsening straits. Jerome’s response is to fast-forward through it or turn off the sound--just as he fast-forwards through his life and turns off his feelings.

The play ends on this truthful sour note. It solidifies the content and confirms Ayckbourn’s assessment (quoted in the program) that “farce is a tragedy that has been interrupted.” Never more graphically than here.

A final word of commendation for Krakowski’s remarkable intelligence as a semi-bimbo, the excellent sound design by Jon Gottlieb, costumes by Robert Blackman and lights by Peter Maradudin.

“Henceforward ... ,” Mark Taper Forum, 135 N. Grand Ave., Music Center. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2:30 p.m. Ends Dec. 29. $26-$32; (213) 365-3500, (714) 740-2000, TDD (213) 680-4017). Running time: 2 hours, 35 minutes.

‘Henceforward’

John Glover: Jerome

Jane Krakowski: Zoe

Paula Wilcox: Corinna

Dakin Matthews: Mervyn

Ellen Idelson: Geain, aged 13

Brandi Chrisman: Geain, aged 9

Alan Shearman: Lupus

Nike Doukas: Rita

A Center Theatre Group-Mark Taper Forum production. Playwright Alan Ayckbourn. Director Tom Moore. Set Ralph Funicello. Lights Peter Maradudin. Costumes Robert Blackman. Hair and make-up Tony Perez, Ursula Ward. Sound Jon Gottlieb. Music Larry Delinger with Craig Sibley. Video Evan Mower, Jon Gottlieb. Dialect coach Carla Meyer. Production stage manager Mary Michele Miner. Stage manager Tami Toon.