There’s a knock at the door

Opportunity knocks in Rick Robinson’s relationship drama “Asymmetry,” but once the door has been opened, no one seems to know what to do next. That’s because the hard part still remains: Determining whether the person at the threshold is someone you want to admit into your life.

Lucid by Proxy presented a version of this play in a larger theater a year ago as part of EdgeFest. Robinson has since refined the material, which is now being presented in the company’s usual Silver Lake performance space. The place doesn’t seem much larger than a living room, which is perfect, because this play takes place in a living room and is meant to be experienced up close.

The first knock at the door unites Julius (Alan Loayza) and Priscilla (Shannon Nelson). They are one of three couples occupying the room, though none is aware of the others. Next come Miguel (Alex Fernandez) and Sandy (Melody Doyle), then Maggie (Kyra Zagorsky) and Cody (David Nett). Two of the pairs are online acquaintances meeting for the first time; the other is reconnecting after a long estrangement.

The participants, in each instance, feel damaged and/or unlovable. Things go awry; unkind things are said; tears are shed. As co-directed by Robinson and Patty Ramsey, everything looks and sounds absolutely real.

The peeping-Tom audience witnesses the baring not of bodies (though the sounds of lovemaking reverberate from another room) but of souls.

“Men are looking for symmetry,” Maggie says at one point, quoting a study about the bodily proportions that men look for in women. But Cody, who’s deeper and truer than Maggie realizes, comes back with: “Maybe ... we’re all just looking for balance.”

-- Daryl H. Miller

“Asymmetry,” Paul E. Richards Theater Place, 2902 Rowena Ave., Silver Lake. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 7 p.m. Sundays. Ends Nov. 19. $15. (800) 838-3006 or www.lucidbyproxy.com. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.

‘Splendora’ with quirks and appeals

Specialized appeal adorns “Splendora” at the Celebration Theatre. This deftly performed, sweetly appointed West Coast premiere of the 1995 chamber musical about self-realization and sexual identity in East Texas revels in post-Sondheim storytelling.

Based on Edward Swift’s 1978 cult novel, “Splendora” follows enigmatic Jessica Gatewood (Adriana Rose), a Victorian-clad sprite who suggests a saner Blanche DuBois. The opening chorale finds newly elected sheriff Sue Ella Lightfoot (Elizabeth Greene) and the Splendora Ladies Southern Group eulogizing Jessica, apparently killed in a fire: “Her body was burnt / But our memories wurn’t.”

We flash back to Timothy John Coldridge (Ben Hensley), the hometown boy who fled his effeminizing grandmother 15 years earlier. He returns with Jessica, but only Sue Ella detects the sad-eyed man who mirrors Splendora’s fascinating new bookmobile doyenne. This admittedly precious device proves theatrically rewarding once repressed Brother Leggett (Michael Gregory) enters the fray.

Perhaps composer Stephen Hoffman’s arpeggios and lyricist Mark Campbell’s cheek are more intelligent than inspired, but their ripe talent is evident. Director Ken Salzman and his elegant forces sustain the bucolic Gothic tone, from designer Kurt Boetcher’s lattice-worked set to music director Jake Anthony’s cello-and-woodwinds combo.

Hensley exposes Timothy’s neuroses rather early, yet still blooms against Rose’s refined, trilling aplomb and Gregory’s open-throated sensitivity. Greene gives salty Sue Ella delightful snap, and Janet Clark, Laurie Morgan, Kathryn Skatula and Cory Watson steal the show as the gossipy archetypes.

Peter Webb’s libretto trades Swift’s malice for eccentricity, putting key entities offstage and forcing the resolution. Certain lyrics plod, and there are some blatant Leonard Bernstein lifts. Still, though “Splendora” isn’t wholly splendid, there’s quality amid the quirks.

-- David C. Nichols

“Splendora,” Celebration Theatre, 7051-B Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays. Dark Nov. 23. Ends Dec. 3. $30. (323) 957-1884 or www.celebrationtheatre.com. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes.

‘Audition!’ rings with authority

What actor, struggling in the trenches, doesn’t have an amusing anecdote about “the biz”? However, if the actor falls in the line of duty without achieving fame, that story may be lost in obscurity. “Audition! The Musical,” a world premiere at the Santa Monica Playhouse, gives voice to those voiceless hopefuls who endure the existential rounds of Hollywood auditions in pursuit of a break that may never come.

Although humorous, “Audition” has poignancy to boot. The proceedings sometimes descend into mawkishness, but the point is well made and well taken.

The emphasis here is on child actors -- and that’s no coincidence. Evelyn Rudie, who co-wrote the piece and also stars, is a former child celebrity who rated a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at a tender age. She knows whereof she speaks, and that authority is manifest throughout.

Rudie’s co-contributors include Matt Wrather (music and lyrics) and her husband, Chris DeCarlo (book), with additional material by Emery Bernauer. DeCarlo’s impeccable direction, combined with Linn Yamaha-Hirschman’s musical direction and some deft albeit uncredited choreography, never falters. James Cooper’s lighting and sound is also first rate, as is Ashley Hayes’ production design.

Rudie heads the small, excellent ensemble consisting of herself, Serena Dolinsky and Rebecca Coombs. All play multiple roles. The most memorable is Rudie as Sparky-Ann, a washed-up moppet who has survived the vicissitudes of Hollywood with her humanity intact. Indomitable of spirit and tenacious of purpose, Sparky-Ann is forever on the comeback trail, and we delight in her durable perkiness.

-- F. Kathleen Foley

“Audition! The Musical,” Santa Monica Playhouse, 1211 4th St., Santa Monica. 7:45 p.m. Saturdays, 6:45 p.m. Sundays. Ends Jan. 28. $25.50. (310) 394-9779, Ext. 1. Running time: 1 hour, 20 minutes.

Iphigenia goes on a (mind) bender

Hmm. Here’s a concept: Iphigenia, the sacrificial daughter of ancient Greek myth, is reincarnated in the present-day Americas, where she attends a rave haunted by the slain women of the Mexican border town Ciudad Juarez.

Son of Semele gives Caridad Svich’s play the heady, high-tech feel of a rave by presenting it with thumping trance music and towering video projections in the hulking shell of a building at the edge of downtown Los Angeles. It’s brave but overwrought and under-thought.

The first clue is its title: “Iphigenia Crash Land Falls on the Neon Shell That Was Once Her Heart.” Iphigenia (Sharyn Gabriel) is daughter of the leader (Richard Azurdia) of an unspecified country. She appears pampered, but she’s been subjected to horrors, with fresh unpleasantness in store. Seeking oblivion, she slips off to attend a rave.

As the night progresses, she encounters a homeless woman (Michelle Ingkavet) who tries to alert her to brutalities under her father’s regime, is shadowed by the ghosts of Juarez (Azurdia, Alexander Wells and Jonathan C.K. Williams in three awkward drag performances) and is fed mind-altering substances by the tormented club singer Achilles (Doug Barry).

Reality keeps slipping back and forth between the actual and video-projected worlds, one of many intriguing qualities in this presentation overseen by director Matthew McCray. But it’s a hallucinatory blur that too often leaves viewers thinking: Huh?

-- D.H.M.

“Iphigenia,” the Studio Space at Shakespeare Festival/LA, 1238 W. 1st St., L.A. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 7 p.m. Sundays. Ends Dec. 3. $20. (800) 838-3006 or www.sonofsemele.org. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.

They’ve been around how long?

Playwright Paula Vogel may be a Pulitzer Prize winner (“How I Learned to Drive”), but despite her undeniable knack for vivid characterizations, her plots can be frustratingly desultory and unformed.

A case in point is “The Oldest Profession,” now enjoying -- or suffering through -- its West Coast premiere at the Odyssey. The play is set on New York’s Upper West Side during the early 1980s as five veteran prostitutes, members of the same long-established stable, ply their trade to an aging but appreciative clientele. It happens that these women learned that trade in New Orleans’ fabled Storyville -- a red-light district that was closed by the authorities in 1917.

Do the math. Perhaps Vogel meant her play to be set in some farcical, heightened reality, but that intention is unclear. Indeed, the premise of her play is so chronologically unlikely that we are left wondering just how long these fleshly vendors have actually been peddling their papayas.

As the characters succumb to age and penury, they each have a solo musical number, after which their spirits are sent to a sumptuous Storyville salon, complete with a bluesy piano player (excellent Beverly Craveiro).

Director Ken Sawyer tries to make sense of the silliness, but his veteran cast, which includes Eve Brenner, Kelly Britt, Sally Wells Cook, Lisa Richards and Sara Shearer, got off to a shaky start on opening weekend. Still, the performers manage to extract humor from their wobbly material. If nothing else, “Profession” succeeds as a prime opportunity for seasoned actresses to strut their stuff -- but it’s a hard sell on a cold street corner.

-- F.K.F.

“The Oldest Profession,” Odyssey Theatre Ensemble, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles. 8 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Call for exceptions. Ends Jan. 14. $22.50-$25. (310) 477-2055. www.odysseytheatre.com. Running time: 1 hour, 45 minutes.

Little impact in ‘Crumple Zone’

In an automobile, the “crumple zone” is that element of the chassis designed to absorb energy upon impact. A similar Newtonian logic attends “The Crumple Zone.” Buddy Thomas’ sly 1998 study of gay romantic dysfunction on Staten Island at Christmastime remains as well constructed a dramedy as any produced in the last couple of decades. That makes the wan production at the Raven Playhouse in North Hollywood doubly disappointing.

Despite a whiff of sitcom to the exposition by wannabe gypsy Terry (Chris Benton), the caustic pivot of an internecine plot, Thomas conveys the banter of struggling, unrequitedly smitten East Coasters with ease and wicked verve. Terry is mad for button-down Buck (Allen Gardner). Buck in turn adores Alex (producer Gregory Christian), the erstwhile lover of Matt (David Phillips), Terry’s roommate.

“Crumple Zone,” which turns on slapstick, sardonic wit and emotional gravity, is a superior populist vehicle, and this wildly overreaching revival drives it into a showcase wall. While it’s clear that director Elyse Mirto and her hard-working cast love the material, the proceedings display more rehearsal-room ardor than fey effervescence.

Benton plays Terry on one manic, braying note that deflates Thomas’ one-liners. Brian Robert Harris goes way over the top as Terry’s one-night stand, and there is little chemistry to the Gardner-Christian-Phillips triangle. At the reviewed performance, they valiantly crumpled while I, sadly, zoned.

-- D.C.N.

“The Crumple Zone,” Raven Playhouse, 5233 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays and Sundays (no shows Nov. 23 and 30); starting Dec. 1, 8 p.m. Fridays through Sundays. Ends Dec. 17. Adult audiences. $15. (818) 995-9903. Running time: 2 hours.