‘Property’ dazzles with its dysfunction

“Depression is just reality trying to wake you up.” This is one of numerous zingers dotting Justin Tanner’s “Hot Property,” playing the Evidence Room in repertory as part of the Edge of the World Festival. Writer-director Tanner’s first Los Angeles premiere in four years is generally hilarious and representative of its author’s distinctive voice.

Like many Tanner works, “Property” transpires in present-day Los Angeles, at the Beachwood Canyon apartment of protagonist Brett (Matt Huhn). As delineated by Jason Adams and Andy Daley’s expertly tacky poolside setting, many observers may register recognition before the play even begins.

The premise pits veteran 99-seat theater actor Brett against drugs, colleagues, the heartless Industry and, above all, his visiting family, yet another dysfunctional Tanner brood.

They include Brett’s born-again bully brother, Chuck (Nick Offerman), tactlessly optimistic sister, Sissy (longtime Tanner collaborator Laurel Green), and their smother-mother, the incongruously named Joy (Jayne Taini).

This cringe-worthy group tenuously supports Brett’s career, though only Sissy wants anyone’s autograph. Joy and Chuck are skeptical at best, their suspicions aroused by Brett’s cannabis-reeking kitchen, which disgorges playwright Jamie (Darin Anthony), his scary girlfriend, Dory (Alicia Adams), Brett’s agent, Hal (Dean Biasucci), and Slavic-accented Gia (Beata Swiderska). When Brett leaves for a Canadian TV-movie shoot, his friends stage a blowout as the Act 1 curtain falls.

Act 2 picks up post-shindig, with clean-and-sober Brett’s early return leading to confrontations, first with his cronies and then his family. The ensuing mayhem culminates in the arrival of Brett’s new amour, Diana (Mara Casey), an Industry hotshot with her own agenda.

Few writers can rival Tanner’s insight on this milieu, and his skill at authentic characterizations and invective remains matchless. The comments and name-dropping are virtually identical to any average night at Akbar, and the mid-Act 1 reading of Jamie’s terrible screenplay is sidesplitting. As for the family unit, here is Tanner’s satirical ethos in full facile bloom.

The ensemble is delirious, completely attuned to Tanner’s writing and each other. Offerman, his face contorted whether praying or braying, walks away with every scene. Taini’s Joy is hysterical, uttering lines like, “I always assumed all my children would be failures” with casually beatific venom. Green has negotiated these channels before, but Sissy feels newly minted, riotous in her Act 2 outburst.

The slackers are all spot-on, with Adams’ post-Goth dourness particularly apt, while Huhn’s struggle to assert himself amid all this is most endearing.

Casey invests her culture vulture with vivid detailing, although the character’s function in the denouement seems abrupt.

Here is the principal weakness in Tanner’s writing, one that his deliberately rushed direction shares. While his recycling of motifs (especially from “Intervention”) is adroit, the breakneck trajectory introduces multiple themes without fully developing them.

This does not prevent “Hot Property” from scoring big-time laughs, but Tanner might take a page from Kaufman & Hart’s book and structure his next farce in the three-act form.

*

“Hot Property,” Evidence Room, 2220 Beverly Blvd., L.A. Through Oct. 18: Thursdays- Sundays, 8 p.m.; more dates to be announced. Ends Dec. 15. $15-$20. (213) 381-7118. Mature audiences. Running time: 1 hour, 20 minutes.