‘Finder’s Fee’ Loses Its Way

Susan and Mat are having a bad month. Right when their lucrative New York real estate deal is falling apart, their associate in the venture is strangled before their eyes during a routine business dinner. Now, they’re being systematically bedeviled by Dave, a mysterious schemer who works as a security specialist at Susan’s bank--or so he claims. Mat and Susan become romantically involved, but Dave nurses an obsessive yen for Susan. As these mutually Machiavellian schemers struggle to figure out the angles, they descend into a vortex of amorality, sex and betrayal that spins increasingly out of control.

Nothing is quite what it seems in Wesley Moore’s “Finder’s Fee” at the Zephyr--including the fractured plot and the characters’ ever-shifting motivations. Sometimes fierce, sometimes funny and sometimes just plain awkward, Moore’s determinedly inaccessible new play teeters on the border between farce and suspense, never fully committing to either genre in William Partlan’s often cumbersome staging.

Cordelia Richards (alternating in the role with Melinda McGraw) has her winning moments as Susan but projects an innate wispiness that poorly serves her rabidly ambitious character. As Mat, Marc Lynn (alternating with Steve O’Connor) effectively underplays his role but tends to drop his volume to an inaudible whisper. However, John Prosky (who alternates with Scott Campbell) plays Dave with the smarmy, utterly believable intensity of a bona fide stalker, chillingly bent on having it all.

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* “Finder’s Fee,” Zephyr Theater, 7456 Melrose Ave. Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m. $15-$18. (323) 969-2471. Ends July 10. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.