UNDERWEAR FOR CHRISTMAS / LILLIAN THEATER, HOLLYWOOD

Tony Foster’s play “Underwear for Christmas” is only half-dressed and not quite ready to be out in public. Luckily, this Elephant Off Main Theatre Company production at the Elephant Theater at the Lillian Theater streaks by in 55 minutes.

A blended and dysfunctional family gathers for New Year’s dinner. The nagging mother, Vernella, who calls her son Orvis (Brian David Evans) by his older brother’s name, is given vivid life by Janice Paxson. Evans makes a winningly earnest, needy neglected son. As older brother Flint, Robert Foster is loutish, but his character has an undeveloped relationship with his own son, Sandy (played by a stuffed doll). A confrontation with his ex-wife (Nicole Marie Fazio) misses the three-way tug between child and parents. Yet the ex-wife’s entrance affords Vernella the opportunity to put on a sudden facade of sweetness, something Paxson realizes with hideous hilarity.

Playing Harvey, the football-hypnotized head of this household, Matthew Sturiale has few lines and only slightly more to do than the limp doll. His daughter, the self-mutilating (ear- and nose-piercing simulated) suicidal Tiffy (Jennifer Nicole Lynn), has great outfits and makeup, but this joke wears too thin in too little time.

Underwear is what Vernella gives her children for Christmas and what Orvis has decided not to wear anymore. Foster’s play is brief and flimsy and could use more careful thought than Vernella gives her gift-giving.

* 6322 Santa Monica, Hollywood. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m. Dark Dec. 22, 23, 29, 30. Ends Jan 20. $10. (323) 962-0046. Running time: 55 minutes.