THEATER REVIEW : Powers of Imagination Soar in ‘Butterfly’ : Solana Beach’s North Coast Repertory Theatre presents a well-directed, handsomely acted tale of love and delusion.

In 1986, playwright David Henry Hwang read a fantastic tale in the New York Times about a French diplomat, Bernard Boursicot, accused of spying for his Chinese lover. During the course of the trial Boursicot learned for the first time that his lover of 20 years, Shi Pei Pu, was really a man.

How could Boursicot not have known the truth--even if his lover was, as he claimed, “modest” and never fully undressed?

Hwang, seeking the answer in how Shi Pei Pu played on the stereotypes men have about women and the West has about the the East, fictionalized the tale into the taut, richly layered “M. Butterfly,” which won the Tony for best play of 1988.

The show, now at the North Coast Repertory Theatre in Solana Beach, presents a handsomely acted, well-directed, intimate and intense look at the powers of the imagination, delusion and love.

Joyce Wadler’s upcoming book about the affair, “Liaison,” to be published in September by Bantam, makes it clear that Hwang took many liberties with the facts in creating “M. Butterfly.”

Hwang’s Gallimard, based on Boursicot, is a married man in his 30s, unattractive and inept with women, but filled with fantasies about an Asian beauty who will be as slavishly devoted to him as Madame Butterfly was to her faithless Pinkerton.

The real Boursicot was 20 and good-looking, but completely inexperienced with women when he met Shi Pei Pu, who flattered, intrigued and seemed so desperately to need him.

Still, the essential tale remains: Hwang’s Gallimard did fall in love with a man pretending to be a woman, believed for 20 years that man was a woman, spied for her, lied for her, believed he had a child with her and was in such despair when he learned the truth that he tried to commit suicide in prison.

There are at least two clear but equally valid choices to be made in “M. Butterfly” as was so aptly demonstrated on Broadway by John Lithgow and later, David Dukes, who succeeded Lithgow as Gallimard. For Lithgow, Gallimard was a man utterly taken in by his own illusions--a heterosexual male in love with another man’s creation of the “perfect” woman.

Dukes intimated a latent homosexuality that suggested that Gallimard suspected and was titillated by a truth he didn’t want to face about his lover. Under the sharp direction of North Coast’s artistic director Olive Blakistone, Ron Choularton, one of North Coast’s finest actors, takes the heterosexual approach--and makes it sad, funny and completely credible.

P.J. Smith gives an auspicious North Coast debut as Song Liling--the fictionalized Shi Pei Pu. He makes a chilling transformation from soft-voiced woman to menacing man--the pin on which Gallimard, revealed as the play’s true Butterfly, ultimately writhes.

But the entire supporting cast deserves kudos. In particular, Betty Matthews brings just the right touch of desiccated dignity to the role of Gallimard’s abandoned wife, Helga. Tracey McNeil’s sexual aggressiveness as Gallimard’s extra-extramarital affair provides a comic contrast to his relationship with the irresistibly “shy” Song Liling.

Resident set designer Marty Burnett fashions a sumptuous, sweeping red and black set that plays up the dramatic contrasts on the North Coast’s narrow stage. Veteran costume and wig designer John-Bryan Davis outdoes himself with colorful kimonos and fashionable Western garb. The lighting by Patrick Byrnes and sound by Nick Reveles contribute immeasurably to the seductiveness of the mood.

It all adds up to a memorable “Butterfly”--one whose questions about the intricate interplay of love, sex and imagination flutter long after the final bows are taken.

* “M. Butterfly,” North Coast Repertory Theatre, 987D Lomas Santa Fe Drive, Solana Beach. Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. Ends Sept. 19. $14-$16. (619) 481-1055. Running time: 2 hours, 10 minutes. Ron Choularton: Rene Gallimard

P.J. Smith: Song Liling

Dale Delmege: Ambassador Toulon/Man No. 1/The Judge

Don Loper: Marc/Man No. 2/Sharpless

Tracey McNeil: Renee/Woman at Party/Woman in Magazine

Betty Matthews: Helga

Debbie Luce: Comrade Chin/Suzuki/Shu-Fang

Kelly Ozaki: Dancer/Kurogo

Michel Morgan: Noverre Dancer/Kurogo

A North Coast Repertory Theatre production. By David Henry Hwang. Directed by Olive Blakistone. Choreography: Michel Morgan Noverre. Sets: Marty Burnett. Costumes and wigs: John-Bryan Davis. Lights: Patrick Byrnes. Sound: Nicolas Reveles.