Look! Up in the Sky! It’s . . . Just a Man

“Poor Super Man,” the startlingly effective West Coast premiere of Canadian Brad Fraser’s 1994 play, masterfully takes all our conceptions about the Man of Steel as almighty rescuer and reveals the limitations of the fantasy.

At the center of the story, playing at San Diego’s Fritz Theatre, is a successful gay artist, David (Michael Severance). His two close friends are a straight but single and caustic female columnist, Kryla (K.B. Merrill), and a transsexual-in-progress roommate, Shannon (Christopher Wylie), who is dying of AIDS-related complications.

David tries to refresh his waning inspiration by taking on a waiter’s job in a tiny restaurant, run by a man, Matt (Paul Laudenslager), and his wife, Violet (Jeannine Torres). David falls for Matt, who begins to return feelings for him. But Matt is not willing either to leave his wife or admit that he, too, is gay.

But if the plot seems, as David puts it, “too Jackie Collins, even for me,” the dialogue is crisp and funny as it parries and hits sensitive and sometimes tragic points.

“We all lie to each other,” as one character says to another. “It’s how we communicate.”

Under the sure, well-paced artistic direction of Duane Daniels, the individual performances glimmer with complexities.

Severance’s David skillfully makes an arc from the smugly self-assured artist to the painfully vulnerable man. He starts out relishing the idea of his secret identity--successful painter with pull masquerading as a modest Clark Kent-like waiter. But as his Superman-rescue fantasies unfold, they falter. And his stricken face reveals his realization that he cannot save Shannon from her disease, Kryla from her loneliness or Violet, Matt and himself from hurt.

Laudenslager’s Matt is an equally effective portrait of a simple but confused fellow buffeted by emotions he can neither understand nor control.

Merrill’s sharp delivery punches the dialogue as sardonic, sharp-tongued Kryla, a brittle survivor of the male-female date world who describes herself as looking “30 in the right light. When I’ve had lots of sleep.”

Wylie is at once funny and wrenching as the wise, dying Shannon. And Torres finds a way of showing both the vulnerability and strength of Violet, Matt’s duped wife, with a dignity that commands respect.

The nudity in sometimes graphic sex scenes between Matt and his wife--and Matt and David--may prove controversial. When it opened in Cincinnati in 1994, obscenity charges were threatened but never filed. But these scenes are not gratuitous. It’s part of the no-holds-barred passion that makes the characters’ choices so difficult.

Still, the most effective aspect of the show is Fraser’s clever use of projection, skillfully executed by Richard Fellner, that shows what the characters are really thinking.

“Do you ever fantasize about other people?” Violet asks her husband.

“No!” he says emphatically, even as the word “yes” pops up on a surface behind them. And when she asks him, much later, if he does indeed love David, he assures her with a “no,” as “yes” again pops up painfully on the wall.

It’s a painfully revealing moment, a reminder of the lies and half-truths littered through life as we pick our way through the valleys of confusion and uncertainty. And it’s a remarkable offering from the Fritz, the 100th production in the company’s five-year history. The Fritz is a small, low-budget theater, but it throws its all into pushing the envelope.

* “Poor Super Man,” Fritz Theatre, 420 3rd Ave., San Diego. Thursday-Saturday, 8 p.m. Ends Saturday. $10-$15. (619) 233-7505. Running time: 2 hours, 24 minutes.

Paul Laudenslager: Matt

Michael Severance: David

K.B. Merrill: Kryla

Christopher Wylie: Shannon

Jeannine Torres: Violet

A Fritz Theatre production. By Brad Fraser. Directed by Duane Daniels. Sets: Daniel Morris. Lights: Suanne Pauley. Costumes: Judy Watson. Sound: Daniel Morris. Projection design: Richard Fellner. Stage manager: Derrick Sibley.