THEATER REVIEW : A Memorable Journey Into the Heart of Steinbeck Country

Midway through its second year in the heart of Pasadena’s Old Town, the Knightsbridge Theatre has staged its share of hits and misses. When a company simultaneously mounts triple dramatic bills week in and week out, the results are bound to be uneven.

Now, however, with John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men,” the theater strikes a level of distinction that dramatically hikes its promise and its standard of work.

George and Lennie, Steinbeck’s ill-fated, Depression-era ranch hands, have been around since 1937, emblematic of impoverished hope and impossible dreams.

The 10-member cast (with one subtle exception) is excellent. And the texture of life on a hardscrabble ranch, artfully suggested by bales of hay and the sense of dust in the air, is strong enough to almost smell.

But what’s most impressive about Stephen Memel’s direction is his ability to capture the play’s multiple dimensions: its story line, its social protest theme and its allegorical significance.

Hunkered down in a bunkhouse, wily George (Lauren Bass) and dimwitted Lennie (Joseph Stachura) dramatize the dumb, clumsy mass of humanity struggling against implacable, insensitive bosses.

In short, we’re in classic Steinbeck land.

Stachura’s hulking, open-mouthed Lennie catches the yearnings of a character who’s almost a device as much as a character. In Stachura’s hands, he is an inarticulate savage in flapping, unbuttoned overalls who doesn’t know his own strength, especially when it comes to pet mice, puppies and pretty women.

Speaking of women, the production’s single, slight miscue is its female character played by Danielle Burgio, the brazen, man-hungry tart who triggers the violent conclusion. For a saucy, frustrated rancher’s wife, Mae is still a few shades too vermilion, a sleek vision of a Faberge commercial instead of a hick-town wife.

The character who actually gives the look and feel of having slept around hogs is the forlorn old man Candy, so flavorfully played by Michael Earl Reid. He appears as real as a gob of mud.

Bass’ George, who yearns to feel superior and thus needs Lennie as much as Lennie needs him, movingly voices the play’s verbal motif: “Guys like us, that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the world.”

Other sharply etched portraits are Billy Mayo’s embittered black ranch hand; Mark Colson’s staunch, upright buddy; Greg Albanese’s snarly, insecure husband; Jones Clark’s hanger-on, and George Klein’s hefty-bellied boss.

* “Of Mice and Men,” Knightsbridge Theatre, 35 S. Raymond Ave. (Braley Building) Old Town, Pasadena, 5 p.m. Saturday and Jan. 14; 8 p.m. Jan. 14 and Jan. 15. Ends Jan. 15. $15. (818) 440-0821. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.