Retro-hip eye candy that’s fast on its feet

At a Tupperware party in a swank penthouse apartment, a Bettie Page-like siren, sprouting a devil’s tail and horns, is vying to be the center of attention. But she faces stiff competition from a glamour gal whose enormous beehive hairdo provides a nesting place for an exotic bird.

Abruptly, the demonstration of burping plastic gives way to murder. A police inspector arrives with his fez-wearing pet monkey in tow.

Welcome to the retro-hip fantasy world of “Shag With a Twist,” inspired by the work of Southern California artist Josh Agle, otherwise known as Shag. Created by Cynthia Bradley, co-founder of San Pedro City Ballet, in collaboration with Agle, the show is aiming for cult status in a Jetsetter Productions presentation at Los Angeles Theatre Center. Its chances might be improved, however, if it offered something more than sheer attitude.

The murder-mystery story line is conveyed entirely through dance and pantomime, in the manner of Matthew Bourne’s “Nutcracker!” or Susan Stroman’s “Contact.” Constructed largely of 1950s and ‘60s social dance moves, the choreography, by Bradley, is performed to cocktail-lounge and surf music by Chris Lang and Cesar Benitez, with lyrics by Bradley, who also directs.

Like their characters, Katie Malia, as the sirenish Kitty, and Ashia Myers, as the glamorous Slinky, dominate the scene, along with Jordi Ribera as the Lothario Dodge. Costumer Joel Berlin and scenic-lighting designer Douglas D. Smith give Agle’s candy-colored visions vivid three-dimensionality.

The autopsy performed as a game of Operation? Everyone can enjoy that sort of humor. But much of the rest -- veneration of a tiki god? -- will be appreciated only by those already familiar with Agle’s art.

-- Daryl H. Miller

“Shag With a Twist,” Los Angeles Theatre Center, 514 S. Spring St., downtown Los Angeles. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays. Ends June 11. $35 and $45. (888) 515-SHAG or www.shagwithatwist.com. Running time: 1 hour, 55 minutes.

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Anti-Nazi protest is set to music

It’s a source of both inspiration and shame that a public protest against Hitler’s Final Solution that took place inside Nazi Germany was held by apolitical housewives who simply wanted to get their husbands out of jail.

Named after the site of this little-known 1943 episode, “Rosenstrasse” is a new musical from the Company Rep that focuses on the inspirational -- the courage of hundreds of women who defied the Nazi propaganda machine (and the machine guns used to enforced it) to make their voices heard.

Building on an initial stage play by Terry Lawrence (who contributed the book and lyrics), Company Rep resident composer Max Kinberg and artistic director Hope Alexander have given dramatic shape to history through the stories of six protesters. All were German women whose marriage to Jews sheltered their husbands from the initial wave of deportations to concentration camps. But when the men’s protected status was lifted in an abrupt and arbitrary ruling, more than 2,000 of them were rounded up without warning on a single morning.

Gathering outside the converted warehouse where their husbands have been detained, the women voice their histories and dreams in song. Ramming extensive exposition through a verse funnel proves a bit forced at times, but Kinberg’s always-appropriate score illuminates the strength of their love in a more succinct and emotional language than narrative ever could alone. Among the capable lead performers, the standout singers are Mary Van Arsdel and Barbara Haber.

Despite limited production resources, this ambitious piece effectively conveys historical sweep and importance and closes out the Company Rep’s season (and temporary residence at this venue) on a cautionary note. We’re left to grapple with the shameful reality that when the separation between information and propaganda breaks down, few dare to speak out for truth and justice.

-- Philip Brandes

“Rosenstrasse,” Deaf West Theatre, 5112 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Ends April 16. $20-22.50. (818) 506-7550 or www.thecompanyrep.org. Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes.

*

Neurotic lovers meet their match

Author of “T Bone N Weasel,” playwright Jon Klein is a proven talent with inarguable comic facility and a knack for sparkling one-liners. However, Klein’s world premiere comedy “Suggestibility,” at the Little Victory Theatre, is situationally challenged.

The play’s romantically ill-fated hero, Kenneth (Christopher Rydman), a reserved investment whiz, is offbeat to the point of the pathological. Kenneth is so obsessed with his online lover, whom he has never met, that he has largely forgone flesh-and-blood relationships. That all changes when Kenneth falls hard for his seductive co-worker Shawn (Diane Hudock), a yearning vamp with a history of failed relationships. All is well until their jealous associate Chad (John Hansen), who wants Shawn for himself, decides to sabotage their fledgling relationship. How? By exploiting Shawn and Kenneth’s sheer “suggestibility,” manipulating the two with deliberately bad advice and poisonous counsel that rips the susceptible lovers apart.

Cynthia Ignacio’s gleaming, high-tech set and Tom Ormeny’s stark lighting mirror the play’s essential trendiness as does Maria Gobetti’s sophisticated staging. As she proved in “An Evening With the Egos,” Gobetti has a Woody Allen-esque flair for finding the humorous depths beneath the overriding angst of youthful urbanites. Here she exploits all the many comic possibilities.

The actors also display considerable comic flair, especially Hudock, who is bracingly acerbic throughout. Yet Klein devotes so much time to explicating his heroes’ neuroses that he neglects to drum up much sympathy for them. There’s also that troubling “who cares?” factor. If the lovers are this gullible and the course of true love so easily derailed, then why should we give a hoot? Still, if you don’t delve too deeply into the motivations, you’ll find much to entertain in this flawed but funny endeavor.

-- F. Kathleen Foley

“Suggestibility,” Little Victory Theatre, 3324 W. Victory Blvd., Burbank. 8 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays, 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays. Ends May 1. $20-$22. (818) 841-5422 or www.thevictorytheatrecenter.org Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.

*

Writer spins a whale of a tale

We meet writer Matthew Kidd in the middle of a familiar ritual: on the phone, on hold, on his last nerve. Matthew’s screenplay, based on a true historical incident, is a foolproof blockbuster. At least, it would be if he could ever get his pitch past executive assistants.

Alone in his research-crammed loft, Matthew reacts as a frustrated screenwriter will. He enacts, from first credits to final fade-out, his entire rejected epic of how the Massachusetts whaling ship Catalpa set sail in 1875 to rescue six Irish Fenian inmates from an Australian penal colony.

This one-man living-room movie is “Catalpa” at the Alliance Repertory Theatre in Burbank. Donal O’Kelly’s award-winning 1996 solo show provides enough display opportunities to exhaust an entire Yale Drama School class.

These challenges do not faze actor Michael Cassady, whose breathless versatility drives the piece. He tears through a swath of characters, dialects, improvised effects and transformed furniture, his concentrated energy and commitment never faltering.

Spencer Griffin shrewdly re-creates Kristin Horton’s direction of the play’s West Coast premiere in 2004, and Horton’s sound, Brent Beath’s lighting and the uncredited set are all worthy. However, the deliberately sappy movie plot and Matthew’s poignant plight align in theory only. One starts to buy into “Catalpa’s” popcorn saga, but the flashy mechanics steal focus and the sentimental screenplay-within-a-play finale denies Matthew equal weight. Although “Catalpa” is amiably crowd-pleasing, its cinematic and theatrical values exist on opposite shores.

-- David C. Nichols

“Catalpa,” Alliance Repertory Theatre, 3204 W. Magnolia Blvd., Burbank. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays. Ends April 9. $15. (800) 595-4849 or www.tix.com. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.

*

Stepmom smitten with stepson in ‘X’

From the Greeks to Neil Simon, the love triangle has remained one of the sturdiest devices in drama. Playwright Judy Soo Hoo explores the humor and pathos of that familiar triptych in “Solve for X,” a Lodestone Theatre Ensemble production at the Grove Theater Center in Burbank.

Hoo’s evocative drama about a young stepmother’s clandestine obsession for her handsome stepson owes an obvious spiritual debt to Racine’s “Phaedra.” However, the play’s heights of Racinian poeticism are too frequently undermined by a reiterative plot, which belabors the romantic dynamic between its star-crossed lovers without explaining the compelling reasons for their attraction.

At the apex of the story is Hannah (Elaine Kao), a beautiful young math teacher swept into marriage by the charismatic but much older Theo (vigorously effective Kelvin Han Yee). A baron of bottled tea drinks, Theo spends most of his time empire building in the Pacific Rim, leaving the bored Hannah to find comfort in the arms of his only son, Henry (Roger Fan). When Theo is reported lost in a plane crash, Hannah sees her opportunity to formalize her long-standing affair with Henry. But Henry’s natural repugnance against such an “unnatural” marriage, coupled with Theo’s sudden return, seem likely to dash Hannah’s hopes.

Playing multiple roles, Emily Liu and Kipp Shiotani function as a sort of informal Greek chorus, commenting on the action and providing pungent comic relief. Yet Henry’s essential callowness never evolves into a fully rounded adult sensibility, so Hannah’s obdurate pursuit of him seems capricious and unmotivated -- more wheedling than wooing. Despite that, “X” is both sophisticated and humane, always watchable and frequently moving. Director Jeff Liu elicits sensitive performances from his handsome cast, particularly Kao, whose captivating blend of delicacy and forcefulness ameliorates Hannah’s caprices and makes her genuinely poignant.

-- F. Kathleen Foley

“Solve for X,” GTC Burbank, 1111-B West Olive Avenue, Burbank. 8 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Ends April 24. $15. (323) 993-7245. www.lodestonetheatre.org. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.