STAGE REVIEW : Tanner’s ‘Teen Girl’ Speaks to Youth Concerns

The title is like that of an old-fashioned, pre-Sassy magazine: “Teen Girl.” It’s the latest of Justin Tanner’s pop plays at the Cast Theatre.

With a more developed story than “Party Mix” and more dimensional characters than “Zombie Attack,” “Teen Girl” has the potential of running at least as long as Tanner’s longest-running shows, though it might be handicapped by the fact that some of its potential customers are too young to drive or won’t get parental permission to go see a play in deepest Hollywood.

That’s too bad. This play isn’t likely to win the official endorsement of high school field trips; it’s got plenty of four-letter words, onstage drug use and offstage sex. But it also speaks directly to teen-age concerns, and it does so with an irrepressible sense of humor and a clear-eyed, ultimately moral point of view. This play could show kids that the theater is a place that matters.

Like the title, the subject matter might have been lifted out of a magazine: Susan (Laurel Green) is about to graduate from high school, Class of ‘79, in Salinas. But she isn’t going to the prom. She feels overweight (though she isn’t) and under-cool.

Her friend Tricia (Dana Schwartz) is the definitive peer pressurer. With Susan’s mom in Vegas one Friday evening, Tricia comes over and begins a campaign to upgrade Susan’s social status. She is assisted by the sudden appearance of Susan’s former neighbor and baby-sitter Mary (Thea Constantine), who is about eight years older, if not wiser. Mary is back home from Los Angeles for the weekend with her latest punkster boyfriend (French Stewart) in tow.

Together, they try to push Susan into their own warped idea of adulthood--which more closely resembles an extended adolescence. They bring in the liquor and marijuana and recruit Susan’s classmate Dennis (Jon Amirkhan) as a potential prom date and sexual adventurer for Susan.

But not everything goes according to plan. Nosey neighbor Mrs. Burns (Judy Jean Berns), who sees herself as Susan’s confidante, drops in on the pretext that Susan’s mom asked her to do so.

More significantly, Susan herself is torn by ambivalence about what’s going on. She tries to “just say no,” but life is more complicated than that.

The story may sound trite, but Tanner’s ear for teen-age language and his perception of teen-age psychology is uncanny (at least it seems that way to this far-from-teen-aged writer).

The dialogue moves quickly, sometimes overlapping, occasionally competing with the omnipresent sounds of the stereo in the next room--but even that is a testament to the accuracy of Tanner’s vision.

Doubling as director, Tanner picked many of the actors from his unofficial repertory company, and their work has the smoothness of a veteran ensemble. Green is a beguiling vessel for Susan’s combination of innocence and anxiety and toughness, and Schwartz sees that Tricia displays those same ingredients, though in somewhat different proportions. No one overplays, not even in the rowdiest moments.

This is a simple, funny little play. Its transparency might not satisfy those who want more subtext. But the same quality makes it enormously accessible to its target audiences of teen-agers, those who must cope with teen-agers--and those who still remember when.

“Teen Girl,” Cast Theatre, 804 N. El Centro Ave., Hollywood. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m., Sundays, 7 p.m. Ends July 26. $12. (213) 462-0256. Running time: 1 hour, 20 minutes.