Now, don’t be shy

“MY Fair Lady” it’s not.

I’m talking about “The Party Show,” the latest production from the Los Angeles-based theater group Burglars of Hamm, formerly the Hamburglars. (The group ditched the McDonald’s character name when they realized lawyers wearing golden arches lapel pins might come after them.)

There are six Burglars altogether: Matt Almos (who also serves as the group’s director), Carolyn Almos, Jon Beauregard, Selina Woolery Smith, Victor Ortado and Todd Merrill. All but Merrill met while studying at CalArts. All are in their 30s. And all are moderately to very kooky.

So is “The Party Show,” which is playing through May 11 at the Actors Lab in Hollywood, a location that met the group’s special needs. Explains Beauregard: “We went around town and asked, ‘Can we be really loud in your theater?’ ”

It becomes apparent early in the show, actually even before the show begins, that this is not going to be a normal theatergoing experience.

Sure, there’s the usual pre-show milling about and gladhanding -- actor types greeting actor types -- as well as the requisite makeshift refreshment stand in the lobby. This one sells lollipops and Tecate beer.

But there are also 3-D glasses, given to each person who enters, and a fair number of “woo woo” outbursts from Beauregard in particular. The idea is to get the audience revved up for the party to come.

A couple of minutes before the theater doors open, several Burglars burst into the room, a bunch of boozed-up party hounds shouting things like, “This party is so blanking rocking,” grabbing one another’s private parts, getting in people’s faces and generally being very fraternity-ish. A guy holding a video camera chases them around, taping the mayhem as well as the horrified and bemused looks on audience members’ faces.

The first scene in the play has the Burglars and the audience watching this very footage. It’s part of a blurring between performers and audience that continues throughout and that has become something of a Burglars trademark.

“We try to make things truly participatory,” says Carolyn Almos.

Consider “Easy Targets,” the show that follows “The Party Show.” In this, the audience is invited to hurl socks at the Burglars when their intentionally cliched and shlocky performances become, well, too cliched and shlocky. At least the Burglars don’t throw the socks back at the audience. In “The Party Show,” on the other hand, the audience does not escape the Burglars’ wrath as they are insulted, repeatedly, in words that can’t be printed here, for their inability to party hard enough.

“We tend to be a little confrontational with our audiences,” says Beauregard.

The assault in “The Party Show” comes only after Sammy Hagar appears on-screen with the following entreaty: “Sammy Hagar expects you to rock. Do as I say or die! The time has come for you to raise the roof.” The fictional stakes are high, in other words.

The Burglars also tend to be confrontational with one another. “Everybody is constantly daring people to do things because we all know each other so well,” says Beauregard.

“We might make a point of, what’s the worst thing I can make Todd do?” adds Almos. “I don’t think we’ve pulled any punches.”

Indeed, “The Party Show” touches on cannibalism, infidelity, live sex, religion and other off-limits subjects, all within the context of partying naturally.

There are an uncomfortable few moments when Smith, transformed into a catlike seductress, works her wiles on a nebbishy-looking fellow in the front row. At least she tries to. There’s a PG-13 lap dance, a high kick over his balding head. Still, the guy seems unmoved. Suddenly the entire cast is questioning his manhood.

I half expect the fellow to stand up, wind up and sock a couple of players in the kisser. Fortunately, deep sigh, he’s a plant. There are others too. It keeps the audience alert and wondering who among them is undercover.

If all this sounds silly and ridiculous, it is. Still, there’s more going on than what Almos calls “these idiots who are partying.”

“We sort of talk about why do you party,” continues Almos, “what it’s like to be our age and feel that transition from being really young to thinking you’re really young but you’re not.”

“There’s so much desperation attached to partying,” adds Beauregard. “Also, there’s this brutal underbelly to partying.”

Ultimately, every Burglar show shares the same objective. “We just really want our audiences to be entertained,” says Beauregard. “But if you don’t have a sense of humor about what you do or the theater, and it’s all so precious that it can’t be poked at a little, then you probably would not like our show.”

Everyone else, party on.

*

‘The Party Show’

Where: Actors Lab, 1514 N. Gardner St., Hollywood

Ends: May 11

Cost: $15

Info: (323) 769-6334