Complex love in a modern Irish myth

In Irish folklore, the hero Oshin dwells in the land of eternal youth. Slowly he comes to miss his friends and ventures to Earth once more. But the moment he steps foot on the ground, time rushes up around him, and he’s turned into an old man.

Billy Roche’s “Poor Beast in the Rain,” the absorbing inaugural production by the new Salem K Theatre Company, offers a modern version of that myth. In mid-1980s Ireland, the regulars at a Wexford betting shop run by taciturn Steven (Michael O’Hagan) and his daughter, Eileen (Kate Steele), gather to crank up for the Hurling Finals.

Turns out the real suspense isn’t about the game but the reappearance of Danger Doyle (Andrew Connolly), the dashing bad boy who ran off with Steven’s young wife. Eileen pines for her ma, oblivious to the love-struck Georgie (Christopher Carley); Danger’s old mate, Joe (Kevin Kearns), can’t wait to relive his wild youth, while a torn-up Molly (Joanne Whalley) torches for Danger.

This prodigal has been made into a legend by people who don’t know how to move on, and his return sets their mythmaking to the test. But if Danger back in town doesn’t quite set off the fireworks the play promises, that’s half the point. Director Wilson Milam’s intimate production compels less through plot than with lived-in verite. We feel like eavesdroppers at a corner table in set designer Laura Fine Hawkes’ grungy shop, all chalk dust and sticky counters, and the fine ensemble work on view will strengthen as the run continues. Carley brims with clammy youth, while Whalley and Connolly spark and burn.

Roche has an easy way with local talk: Joe says of the slim Eileen: “there’s more meat on a butcher’s apron”; Molly dismisses a young flirt as “the latest little tearaway.” That old Irish turn from disappointment to poetry can still cast a spell. “Poor Beast” calls out a bittersweet farewell to the past -- a lament to quiet for in loud times.

-- Charlotte Stoudt

“Poor Beast in the Rain,” Matrix Theatre, 7657 Melrose Ave., Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays. Ends March 16. $25 to $30. (323) 960-4420. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes

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Endearing and emotional ‘Dead’

Intimate nuances carry “James Joyce’s The Dead” at Open Fist Theatre Company. By returning Richard Nelson and Shaun Davey’s delicate 2000 musical based on James Joyce’s elegiac short story to its chamber origins, director-designer Charles Otte achieves a piercing immediacy.

A succes d’estime on Broadway and at the Ahmanson Theatre, “The Dead” largely adheres to Joyce’s final “Dubliners” entry. As guests arrive behind the scrim that swathes designer Kis Knekt’s set, Gabriel Conroy (Rob Nagle) recalls the annual Yuletide party hosted by his aunts, Julia and Kate Morkan (Jacque Lynn Colton and Judith Scarpone), and their niece, Mary Jane (Teresa Willis). Nelson’s Tony-winning libretto offers an eavesdropper’s perspective, driven by Davey’s evocative songs. The good-humored naturalism telescopes into existential poetry after the party, when Gretta (Martha Demson), Gabriel’s wife, shares a long-held secret that shatters his reality.

In tandem with fine designers, Otte stages this ephemeral material to a fare-thee-well, playing the violin in musical director Dean Mora’s combo himself, and his remarkable cast follows suit. Jake Wesley Stewart’s music student, Sarah Buster’s political renegade, and Michael Franco and Nicola Hersh as drunken Freddy Malins and his formidable mum typify the general spontaneity, which peaks at the group dance to “Naughty Girls.”

Few are trained singers, though, so prepare accordingly. Colton captures the affecting moment when Julia’s voice falters midparlor song and Scarpone’s pert Kate joins in to cover. Conversely, the penultimate duet between Julia and her younger self (Amy Tzagournis) cannot quite erase memories of originator Sally Ann Howes.

Similarly, Nagle’s touching Gabriel and Demson’s sensitive Gretta require forbearance at the finale, where their exposed feelings distort intonation in favor of emotional heft. It isn’t snow falling softly at the end of this heartfelt revival but bittersweet Joycean tears.

-- David C. Nichols

“James Joyce’s The Dead,” Open Fist Theatre Company, 6209 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays. Ends March 22. $25. (323) 882-6912. Running time: 1 hour, 35 minutes.

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An inventive adaptation of Fo

The sad thing about playful cubs is that all too soon they become venerable old lions, so fearful and majestic that they are approached with caution.

Italian playwright Dario Fo, winner of the 1997 Nobel Prize for literature, certainly numbers among the lions of the modern theater. Fo ascended to fame decades ago with his distinctive mix of leftist polemics and commedia dell’arte. But there’s a clear danger for present-day interpreters, who may be so overawed by Fo’s reputation that they forego his righteous radicalism in favor of reverential exegesis.

Fortunately, director Diana Wyenn and her cheeky actor-compatriots, who are presenting Fo’s “Accidental Death of an Anarchist” at the Unknown Theater in Hollywood, take the opposite tack. Don’t expect anything remotely stuffy here. In fact, don’t expect to see Fo’s play, at least not in its familiar form. Guided by Gillian Hanna’s translation and Brenda Varda’s contemporary script revisions, Wyenn and company deliver an inventive, loose adaptation that bristles with contemporary references.

Based on an Italian police scandal, Fo’s famous 1970 farce about a brutal police interrogation gone fatally awry and its resulting cover-up seems more topical than ever.

That’s the serious issue at the heart of the romp, and it’s ferreted out with inspired inanity by this Monty Python-esque cast, which includes Taras Los, Richard Hilton, Stephen Simon, Adam Edgar, Alla Poberesky and Chris Covics, who also designed the production’s depressingly institutionalized office set. The show eventually loses steam in topical ranting too generalized to be cogent. Still, this “Anarchist” captures the impertinence and brio of Fo at his rambunctious best.

-- F. Kathleen Foley

“Accidental Death of an Anarchist,” Unknown Theater, 1110 N. Seward St., Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 6 p.m. Sundays. Ends March 15. $18 to $24. (323) 466-7781. Running time: 1 hour, 40 minutes.

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Artistic courage dissected

In “Another Vermeer” at Theatre 40, authenticity clashes with perception, with often engrossing results. Bruce J. Robinson’s ambitious drama about a Dutch art dealer painting for his life in post-WWII Amsterdam raises intriguing questions about personal integrity and artistic courage.

Based on real events, “Another Vermeer” concerns Han Van Meegeren (Robert Mackenzie), first seen hectoring Bram (Joe Briggs), the angelic-faced guard he has cajoled into posing as Jesus. Van Meegeren wants to re-create Vermeer’s “Christ at Emmaus” at the easel that centers designer Jeff G. Rack’s spare setting, and we soon learn why.

Once a promising artist, Van Meegeren is under arrest for selling a Vermeer masterpiece to Reichsmarschall Hermann Goering. The antic sociopath faces the gallows unless he can prove that he pawned off his expert forgery on the Nazi. Enter Bredius (James Sloyan), the prominent critic who destroyed Van Meegeren’s early career, now perhaps the key to his exoneration, as past compromises and present terrors blur through a haze of absinthe and drugs.

Director Alex Craig Mann keeps his canvas taut, using the venue resourcefully, with Meghan Hong’s moody lighting and David Bartlett’s multidirectional sound especially effective. Mackenzie’s frazzled, flippant intensity flirts with anachronism, but he registers against Briggs’ unaffected charm. Sloyan’s imposing critic makes his face-off with Van Meegeren a high point.

Though “Another Vermeer” would benefit from fewer wisecracks and more scenes, its central themes have noteworthy resonance.

-- David C. Nichols

“Another Vermeer,” Theatre 40, Reuben Cordova Theatre, Beverly Hills High School campus, Beverly Hills. Call or go to www.theatre40.org for schedule. $20. (310) 364-0535. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.

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Bogged down in killers’ motives

What are the odds that two plays about Leopold and Loeb, the thrill killers whose 1924 murder was labeled “The Crime of the Century,” would be playing simultaneously a couple of blocks from each other on Hollywood’s Theatre Row?

“Dickie & Babe: The Truth About Leopold and Loeb,” a world premiere at the Blank Theatre Company’s 2nd Stage, is a detailed account of the famous child murderers from a macrocosmic perspective, complete with a large cast and actual transcripts of police interrogations and courtroom proceedings. By contrast, “Thrill Me,” the musical at the Hudson Backstage, is a dark and microcosmic two-character piece focusing on the master-slave pathology between the youths.

“Dickie & Babe” has been a labor of love for its writer-director, Daniel Henning, the Blank’s longtime artistic director, who has spent several years exhaustively researching his jazz-age era play. Unfortunately, Henning’s shaky drama has a bad case of jake leg. Crime nuts may be intrigued, but those who don’t share their fetishistic fascination for the case may find the going tough.

Henning’s staging staggers as well. On the plus side, Aaron Himelstein’s pinched and perfectionist “Babe” Leopold is richly rendered, the mainstay of the production. But Henning blunders with his treatment of Dickie Loeb (Nick Niven), over-emphasizing Loeb’s giggling, childlike glee at the expense of his sociopathy.

Others in the cast turn in thoughtful performances. As Clarence Darrow, Weston Blakesley does his best fleshing out a character dropped into the action belatedly. Effective in the other roles she plays, Vicki Lewis is self-consciously strident as a publicity-hungry flapper, a performance more appropriate to musical comedy than this “documentary play.”

-- F. Kathleen Foley

“Dickie & Babe,” 2nd Stage Theatre, 6500 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Ends March 16. $22 to $28. (323) 661-9827. Running time: 2 hours, 40 minutes.

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Marital woes played for laughs

The marital bedroom is a crowded place. The boss tends to intrude, as do repairmen, the kids and all of those fitter, younger people who, once we’ve reached a certain age, seem to rise up everywhere, intent on making us feel old.

These are the sorts of factors that send a middle-aged couple to a ridiculously expensive hotel for an attempt at romantic reconnection in “Sexy Laundry.” A situation comedy that flirts briefly but none too committedly with drama, Michele Riml’s play seems capable of more than it delivers. Its flaws are effectively botoxed, however, at the Hayworth Theatre, where it’s vigorously directed by Gary Blumsack and played for all it’s worth by film and TV veterans Frances Fisher and Paul Ben-Victor.

The hotel stay is fiftysomething Alice’s idea. (In Joel Daavid’s wry design, it’s one of those places that tries way too hard to be retro-cool). A copy of “Sex for Dummies” is brought along for inspiration. When Henry, the hubby, groans incredulously at the book’s suggestions, romance devolves into recrimination.

Fisher, mother to Kate Winslet’s character in “Titanic,” is game for whatever foolishness the situation requires of her, as when she backhands the uncooperative Henry into a reclining position while intently studying the book for further instructions. Henry’s a fairly sweet guy; he’s just lost touch with that part of himself. Ben-Victor (“The Wire”) grumbles and stonewalls quite amusingly, hinting, all the while, at the tenderness underneath.

Husband and wife eventually confess their insecurities, but this play -- widely performed back home in Riml’s Canada -- is headed not toward instructive insight but toward a well-telegraphed, laugh-it-away resolution.

-- Daryl H. Miller

“Sexy Laundry,” Hayworth Theatre, 2509 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays. Ends March 16. $25. (213) 389-9860 Running time: 1 hour, 25 minutes.