Puppets star in tale of feudal Japan

A farmer’s quest to rescue his samurai son’s demon-snared soul, a contemporary subtext about the true cost of war: There’s nothing childish about Triumvirate Pi Theatre Company’s modest but effective family puppet play, “Kitsune No Cho-Chin” (The Fox Lantern).

Inside the social hall of the Centenary United Methodist Church in Little Tokyo, on a countertop stage flanked by wood-and-paper screens, the cast of small, frozen-faced, loose-limbed actors is coaxed into silent eloquence by hooded puppeteers in black.

Created by writer-director Leslie K. Gray and puppet designer Sam Hoji Hale, with puppeteers Michael Oosterom, Eli Presser and Janet Song, this tale of ghosts and demons, duty and loss, war and redemption in feudal Japan unfolds through shadow puppetry, projections and Bunraku-style execution.

Wisely, Gray forgoes dialogue, allowing the puppeteers’ subtle manipulations, Kathi O’Donohue’s deft lighting and composer George Abe’s live performance of his ambient score -- bamboo flutes, bells, brass cymbals and taiko drums -- to speak for themselves in this pocket-sized production.

-- Lynne Heffley

“Kitsune No Cho-Chin” (The Fox Lantern), Centenary United Methodist Church, 300 S. Central Ave., L.A. 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturdays, 2 and 4 p.m. Sundays, except no 2 p.m. show this Saturday and no shows Aug. 13. Ends Aug. 20. $10, adults; $5, ages 10 and younger and full-time students. (213) 617-9097 or www.tri-pi.org. Running time: 45 minutes.

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Some detours on the road of life

The open road serves as an apt backdrop for exploring our peculiar shared heritage of displaced lives and reinvented identities in Carlos Murillo’s new play, “Unfinished American Highwayscape #9 & 32.”

The lone motorists prowling the asphalt in the dead of night are skillfully differentiated by the Theater@Boston Court ensemble under Jessica Kubzansky’s atmospheric direction. Drawn from life stories Murillo encountered while researching the back roads of the U.S. highway system, these portraits are steeped in the quirky specifics of real life -- funny and poignant by turns, despite some artifice in the narrative structure.

What starts out as individual monologues evolves into dialogue as history and circumstances connect the various travelers. Gifted comic actor Patrick Thomas O’Brien is instantly riveting as a lonely Minnesota high school teacher who collects souvenir refrigerator magnets. On separate journeys, a popular blues singer (Karim Prince) and his ex-wife (Carlease Burke) offer hilariously contradictory takes on their failed marriage.

A young mother (Ashley West Leonard) indulges her fascination with people who abandon their cars and disappear. The widow (Casey Kramer) of an adulterous junkyard sculptor sets out in search of a new life. A man who restocks gumball machines (Matt Foyer) reflects on the reasons for his rootless existence.

After abandoning her family years ago, a woman (Meghan Maureen McDonough) finds herself drawn back by emotional ties she couldn’t completely sever. The saddest case is a burned-out preacher (Will Collyer) trying to follow in the footsteps of the dead evangelist father he never knew.

Kubzansky’s staging emphasizes physical isolation with minimal embellishment (hand-held flashlight beams suggesting headlights). However, the use of extensive direct address to the audience clashes with the supposed mutterings of solitary nocturnal drivers.

The characters’ stories and interrelationships emerge in fragments of speech and occasional song that gradually fit together with jigsaw puzzle intricacy; sometimes the cleverness of the intellectual exercise eclipses emotional involvement.

At their best, however, Murillo’s fractured narrative and junkyard imagery poetically mirror the displaced lives he chronicles -- telling a story, as one character puts it, “using all the stuff that people throw away.”

-- Philip Brandes

“Unfinished American Highwayscape #9 & 32,” Boston Court, 70 N. Mentor Ave., Pasadena. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays. Ends Sept. 3. $30. (626) 683-6883 or www.bostoncourt.org. Running time: 1 hour, 45 minutes.

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Wedding weekend turns topsy-turvy

What would you do if your ex-lover, now a converted member of a spiritual cult, invited you to her wedding in a remote rural retreat teeming with true believers? And on the eve of the ceremony, you discovered the romantic spark was still there -- and was mutual?

That’s the quandary facing Len (Matt Ford), a recovering drug addict contemplating a desperate rescue mission in Sam Marks’ edgy contemporary comedy, “The Bigger Man.” David Vegh’s staging for Circle X Theatre Company pushes many buttons and raises intriguing and unusually complex questions about behavioral and ethical boundaries. Unfortunately, it gives us few reasons to care about the answers.

As soon as they check into the dingy hotel room they’re sharing for the wedding weekend, Len and his slacker friend Rick (Richard Augustine) run afoul of the strict conduct dictated by the Foundation, a shadowy organization that transforms its members into hyper-rational robots through ominous “healing” ceremonies. As explained and enforced by the bride’s authoritarian brother (Thomas Fiscella), the house rules include separating the male and female guests and, of course, no drugs.

Fat chance on either count -- the roommates are busted for smoking pot as soon as they arrive. Rick then maneuvers for some sack time with his girlfriend (Linda Bailey Walsh), leaving the coast clear for Len’s amorous reunion with the bride, Lily (Jennifer A. Skinner, alternating with Jen Kays).

Len would like nothing better than to whisk Lily away from the Foundation and return to their old hedonist ways. Events take an unexpected turn when Lily counters his offer with an invitation to join her in the cult and marry her (her fiance cheerfully agreeing to step aside).

Originating in a setup that bears no relationship to recognizable human behavior, Len’s equally unconvincing crisis is an exercise in unmitigated self-pity. Deeply flawed antiheroes may have trendy appeal, but the absence of a single likable personality trait anywhere on the stage makes it difficult to root for anyone.

-- P.B.

“The Bigger Man,” Theatre/Theater, 5041 Pico Blvd., Los Angeles. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays. Ends Sept. 10. $15-$20. (213) 804-5491 or www.circlextheatre.org. Running time: 2 hours.