Titillation in Store ‘For the Curious’

As Dennis Miles indicates with the title “For the Curious,” this double-cast bill of five new one-acts at the Theatre of NOTE is meant to pique one’s interest. At times, however, Miles resorts to tawdry gimmickry that detracts from his writing and the piece’s impact.

Walking into this cozy venue to see a half-drawn curtain partially revealing a recumbent naked man with a white sheet coyly draped over his derriere cleavage, one knows titillation is something that Miles and directors Daniel Mailley and Kiff Scholl mean to exploit.

In a fluffy voyeuristic trifle, a middle-aged vampire (Carl J. Johnson) admires the reclining figure (porn star Thomas Lloyd). With his pale face surrounded by spit curls, this black-caped figure lectures his apprentice (Scholl) about the appreciation of a naked man’s beauty.

In a purely cerebral tease, Leanne Fonteyn is the “Woman in the Radio.” Clad in a red satin evening gown and strapped to a parachute, she complains about being prisoner to a man’s imagination. Next is a more likely male fantasy situation, “Willow and Dan,” in which a prostitute (Jacqueline Wright) in a red spandex halter dress attempts to fulfill her john’s fantasy (John Mackane).

Returning to a different dimension, Miles portrays a surreal scenario in which silent women in white scarves slowly walk about as a man’s (Donald Agnelli) repressed feelings about his mother transform into a fear of giant white chickens in “Poulet Giganticus.” Miles’ “Monologue for a Century City Secretary” leaps from social consciousness-raising to urban jungle gore as Dawn Greenidge takes us on a wild ride that includes adultery and the butchering of a dog.

Mailley and Scholl give these sketches visual appeal, but this bill mainly consists of light contemplations and cerebral exercises of little emotional impact.

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* “For the Curious,” Theatre of NOTE, 1517 Cahuenga Blvd., Hollywood. Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 4 p.m. Ends March 19. $12 to $15. (323) 856-8611. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.