STAGE REVIEW : Play Seduces but Fails to Satisfy : Sex: ‘Getting Around’ is based on 1896 work by Viennese author Arthur Schnitzler but falls short of the original.

In the first scene of “Getting Around,” a prostitute ensnares her target with aggressive sexuality. The same can be said for the production she appears in.

It may be the sexiest show in town, but it comes with a caveat: the audience is only seduced, not satisfied.

Loosely based on Arthur Schnitzler’s 1896 “Reigen” or “La Ronde,” a play that shockingly exposed the sexual underside of staid, turn-of-the-century Vienna, “Getting Around” is a theatrical expose about sex in San Diego in the age of AIDS. The original German text was translated by Chrissy Vogele, a USIU student, and reshaped by Ralph Elias, artistic director of Blackfriars Theatre. This world premiere marks the first co-production of Blackfriars and USIU.

The piece is extremely explicit, but it’s unlikely to spark the violent demonstrations and court battles engendered by Schnitzler’s original. In each of 10 brief scenes, Schnitzler showed the prelude and aftermath of a casual sexual encounter. One character from each scene appears in the next scene with a new partner, until the prostitute from Scene 1 reappears in Scene 10, completing the circle ( la ronde ). There was an elegant sadness about the play that was reduced to cynicism in the 1950 French film by Max Ophuls and to vulgarity in the 1964 movie with Jane Fonda, directed by her then husband, Roger Vadim.

An American updating was an ambitious undertaking, but the scope of the final product is too narrow. To capture his milieu, Schnitzler drew realistically from the wide social strata of 1890s Vienna. Here in 1990s San Diego, paralleling Schnitzler’s structure, the characters in “Getting Around” nominally include all of the necessary types for a sociological commentary: a call girl, a Naval officer, a doctor, a poet, an actress. But they’re all sanitized and homogenized to the point where they lose any socioeconomic distinction.

The production does show blurred boundaries between sex and love; here they are interchangeable. The play goes boldly into the bedroom and behind the locked doors of the gay bathhouse. The writing captures much of the hypocrisy and manipulation that are standard foreplay to sexual conquest. But Elias, the director, does not trust Elias, the writer. He chooses to go for the laughs, the shtick, the shock value. And he adds layer upon layer of distancing techniques--from posturing mannerism to vaudevillian stylization to breaking the fourth wall between actor and audience. As usual, the talented Elias made a very specific directorial choice, but, in this case, it is an unfortunate one.

The director opts for a non-naturalistic, hyperbolic style. He’s not afraid to be salacious or to reach for bawdy belly-laughs. But he seems to be so bent on stylization that he eschews any honest depiction of the sense of loss, loneliness or despair that accompanies endless, meaningless sexual encounters. We get plenty of sexuality, but no subtlety and no real depth or insight. When the director goes for emotional honesty, as in the bathhouse scene, the result is very gripping. But overall, the production lacks the satiric bite and the bittersweet irony that Schnitzler managed to convey.

The collaboration between professional theater and university training program is felicitous in the creation of the script, but not in the casting. In other theater-university affiliations, such as the Old Globe and University of San Diego, the La Jolla Playhouse and UC San Diego, graduate students are the usual participants. Here, we have undergraduates, and, unfortunately, their inexperience shows. With one exception, there’s a huge gap between the professionals and the actors-in-training. Callum Keith-King has credibility that the other student performers lack. And he has a smirk, an edge, that suggests he is holding something in reserve.

The four professional actors--Ron Choularton, Philip Charles Sneed, Christina Soria and John Blunt--bring a depth to their characters that goes beyond mere societal stereotype.

Actor John Blunt also co-designed the scenery (with Deanna Dean). The spartan screens and platforms, juggled by the prancing, flirtatious actors, prove to be cumbersome and intrusive during scene changes. The periodic use of a TV monitor, showing snippets of MTV videos and a sexual harassment lecture, seems pointless. Only an occasional limply painted palm tree anchors the piece in San Diego; otherwise, we could be anywhere in America.

The lighting (Debra Marks) does not enhance or promote the set. But the sound (Lawrence Czoka), ranging from the Beach Boys to Tina Turner, is lively, hip and appropriate. Stacy Rae’s costumes present a parade of undergarments worthy of Victoria’s Secret.

Certainly, we are titillated. But we walk away unsated. Fortunately, this is a work in progress; with further development, it should become a more satisfying theatrical experience.

“GETTING AROUND”

By Ralph Elias, with Chrissy Vogele. Adapted from “La Ronde” or “Reigen” by Arthur Schnitzler. A co-production of Blackfriars Theatre (formerly the Bowery) and USIU. Directed by Ralph Elias. Sets by John Blunt and Deanna Dean. Costumes by Stacy Rae. Lighting by Debra Marks. Sound design by Lawrence Czoka. Stage manager is Dan Halleck. With John Blunt, Ron Choularton, Callum Keith-King, Keith Jefferson, Mary Lee, Dynell Leigh, Marti Jo Pennisi, Philip Charles Sneed, Cristina Soria. Tickets are $14-$18. Performances are at 8 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays through June 7. At the Bristol Court Playhouse (formerly the Kingston), 1057 1st Ave., at C Street. Call 232-4088.