THEATER : ‘Abel and Cain’ Creators Fight Like Brothers

Something unusual is going on at the Odyssey Theatre. It isn’t always pretty, it isn’t always nice. But it’s incredibly watchable.

“From the beginning, I always wanted to do what other people weren’t doing,” says Fred Curchack, who has won worldwide acclaim for his revisionist takes on Shakespeare, “Stuff as Dreams Are Made On” (from “The Tempest”) and “What Fools These Mortals Be” (from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”). The two solo shows are joined in repertory by the world premiere of “Abel and Cain: A Biblical Debacle,” a darkly comedic treatise on brotherhood by Curchack and Daniel Stein.

The three pieces--which at any given moment can veer wildly from beautiful to grotesque, lyrical to obscene--are a flamboyant mix of several artistic styles and sensibilities. The New York-born Curchack culls from an international reservoir of theatrical training, including Indian Kathakali, Japanese Noh, Balinese Topeng, African dance and a master’s degree from Queens College. Milwaukee native Stein studied at Carnegie-Mellon University and later in Paris with mime master Etienne Decroux, and has spent most of the past 20 years touring and living in Europe.

For Curchack, the itch to perform revealed itself in the seventh grade, when he won a declamation contest for his unorthodox rendition of Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky.” “There was a tumultuous response,” he recalls. “I put my body and soul into it, and I found that it liberated a lot of energy among my peers. I was also exposed to Ionesco and Brecht, dealing with all these metatheatrical questions. And I’ve continued to investigate similar questions in my work--sometimes with humor, sometimes with dead seriousness.”

In spite of his highbrow influences, Curchack swears the pieces are not an intellectual stretch. They have drawn wonderful response from audiences ranging from high school students to Shakespeare scholars at a national conference.

“I’ve performed in countries where they don’t speak English--all over Europe, South America, North Africa . . . People respond to a human event exclusive of Shakespearean content,” he says. “And yet, even the most outlandish liberties (I take) are extrapolations of themes in the play.”

Within those liberties lie a wild imagination--and a lot of Fred.

“When I first started working on ‘Fools’ in 1989, I was in the midst of a divorce after 16 years of marriage and two children. So it was not just exploring the vagaries of romance, but a deeper search for meaning and understanding.” The same applies to his ongoing relationship with the audience. “I’m so familiar with the dynamics of performance--and what infantile, neurotic things brought me to it,” he says. “There’s a tremendous neediness to be loved. Actors are so poignant, sometimes pathetic, because they are so needy.”

It is ironic, then, that so much of Curchack’s work is intentionally prickly, variously needling and stroking his audience. “There is some combativeness,” admits the actor, who has created over 50 original works (including mime, dance, opera and outdoor spectacles) and performed at 36 international theater festivals, while maintaining his faculty position at the University of Texas at Dallas since 1987. “I say explicitly at the beginning of ‘Fools’ that Prospero says people reveal themselves--so I meant to expose the shadowy stuff.”

And he does, with the aid of assorted masks, dolls, dummies and distorted flashlight images.

“Some of it is disgusting,” Curchack allows. “I’ve intentionally chosen negative images. But it’s never intended to titillate. Most of my experiences with audiences are eliciting astonishment, playfulness and delight. It can be a joy, a dance, a high. And with the sad and tragic elements, it can be profound. What’s exciting in live theater, as opposed to TV and movies, is that it’s a real-time, real-life exchange of ideas; you can touch that energy. And with a partner onstage, you can exchange those energies.”

Stein and Curchack have been friends for years; they first worked together in 1989, when Curchack directed Stein in a solo piece, “Windowspeak,” in Dallas.

“While we were rehearsing it, the tension and fight for artistic upper hand was very obvious,” says Stein, who recently designed the choreography for “Medea” at Deaf West in Silver Lake, and will travel to Pennsylvania at month’s end--with a $100,000 National Theatre Artist Residency Grant--to create two plays. In early 1994, Stein learned of a National Endowment for the Arts grant to fund collaborations by solo artists; the result was the partnership with Curchack.

“On the first day,” Stein notes, “there was an explosion about artistic ethics, and Fred said, ‘This has to be in the play’--the wanting to work together and the froth of the fight.”

All three shows are playing at the Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., West Los Angeles. Ticket prices: $12-$21.50. For information and reservations: (310) 477-2055.