STAGE REVIEWS : ‘Barry Moses,’ a Mitzvah It Isn’t

Such a nice boy, that Barry Moses. Too bad he’s stuck with such a synthetic bar mitzvah.

“Barry Moses’ Bar Mitzvah,” at the Hyatt Hotel on the Sunset Strip, is an “interactive” production, which means the audience sits at round tables, as at a real bar mitzvah party. Dinner is served during intermission, and occasionally the actors gently draw the onlookers into marginal conversations or into the dancing.

Theoretically, the characters in this kind of close-up should seem more “real” than in a conventional staging--and the look of these actors is “real” enough. The band, Moishe Pupik & His Magic Men of Melody, sounds genuine. The chicken is something you might be served at a bar mitzvah. Though there is no ice sculpture, the decorations will pass.

But the script is so fake and so shallow that the illusion quickly crumbles.

This “Bar Mitzvah” doesn’t commit as wholeheartedly to the “interactive” style as did, say, “Tony ‘n Tina’s Wedding.” Here, we stay in one room all evening, watching the actors perform in a square space surrounded by audience on three sides and the “head table” on the fourth.

Much of the material, written by producer-director Mansour Pourmand with Joel Reed, is intended for public consumption, as in a Borscht Belt routine or a roast, not as in a play. But occasionally characters engage in supposedly private yet center-stage conversations that are heard and watched by everyone in the room. It’s somewhat jarring.

We’re introduced to the squabbling members of Barry’s father’s family, but the characterizations don’t venture beyond cheap one-liners and stereotypes, and the repartee is sometimes leaden.

The emcee is rotund Uncle Morris (Burt Goodman). When he notes that the hosts aren’t pretentious, we note Barry’s father (Mark Lonow) at the head table, talking on his cordless phone.

Uncle Sammy (Michael D. Edelstein) is cheap. Aunt Sadie (Lila Teigh) is bossy, her husband, Saul (Randy Swerdlick), is timid. Cousin Doris (Diana Harvey) is brainy and unmarried, which prompts old Tante Rivka (Sparkle) to scan the party guests for a potential mate.

Barry’s snooty mother, Gilda (Melissa Berger), is the only representative of her family. She considers herself better than most of her husband’s clan, but still it’s an odd omission not to include any of her relations. It might have spiced up the conflicts.

An even more glaring omission is the absence of any of Barry’s peers. There are no clusters of adolescent boys and girls eyeing each other nervously across the dance floor. When Barry (Marc Smollin) made chitchat at my table during intermission, someone asked him where his friends were. He replied that he was allowed to invite only one, and his best friend said no.

This seems unlikely, given this kid’s vivacity and poise. Smollin plays him as someone who charms everyone he meets (and he sings and dances too). His social skills are unnaturally precocious.

Instead of treating the real concerns of this family (a model here might be Sheri Glaser’s “Family Secrets”), Pourmand tacks on a little plot involving a gangster (Sam Zap) who shows up to demand the $50,000 that Barry’s father borrowed to pay for the bar mitzvah. It’s strictly a make-believe device in a would-be authentic show--and naturally it’s resolved by the only real mensch on the premises, Barry himself.

For the record, the scheduling of this “Bar Mitzvah” is also questionable; it opens just before the High Holy Days and will play on Friday evenings, the start of the Jewish Sabbath, as well as on Saturday evenings and Sunday afternoons.

* “Barry Moses’ Bar Mitzvah,” Hyatt on Sunset, 8401 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 1:30 p.m. Indefinitely. $58-$68. (818) 999-3939. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes.

A Solid ‘Oliver!’ in Redondo Beach

Someone should do “Oliver!” and “Annie” in repertory, in a homeless children’s musicals festival. All the stage mothers in town would have a field day.

In the meantime, we’ll have to make do this fall with seeing “Oliver!” in Redondo Beach, in the latest endeavor by Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities, to be followed by the “Annie” sequel, “Annie Warbucks,” coming soon to San Diego and Hollywood.

Mark Madama’s staging of “Oliver!” is a solid introduction to Lionel Bart’s remarkably durable show about the Dickensian orphan who’s hurled through several levels of 19th-Century London.

Scott Barnhardt looks properly forlorn and creates the requisite sentiment as he asks the musical question, “Where is love?”

David Eric is younger and not quite as oily or as fearsome as one usually imagines Fagin to be, but his professionalism carries him through his paces without missing a nuance.

Sharon Mahoney commands a powerful voice and a valiant presence as Nancy, the great gal who fell for the wrong guy. E. E. Bell looks exactly as one imagines Mr. Bumble, the orphanage proprietor, and Danny Strong is a sharp-angled little whippersnapper as the Artful Dodger.

Ken Holamon’s modular sets, complete with a versatile tower on a turntable, are cluttered and dark, suggesting Dickensian London without being very precise about it, serving several locales equally well. (They were created for the Santa Barbara Civic Light Opera.) Fortunately, Dean Cameron’s costumes add a bit of color to the palette.

Irv Kimber’s musical direction capably supported the singers without overwhelming them; at the Saturday matinee, I noticed only one minor blip in the sound.

* “Oliver!,” Aviation Park Auditorium, Manhattan Beach and Aviation boulevards, Redondo Beach. Today through Saturday, 8 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday matinees, 2 p.m. Ends Sunday. $15.50-$27.50. (310) 372-4477. Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes.