LA Daily News

It's dirty dancing - in the 'Modern' style

Evan Henerson, Theater Critic

Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - There's not a lot of "one-two-three, one-two-three" going on in the American premiere of "Modern Dance for Beginners," unless you count human mating rituals as a kind of dance. Playwright Sarah Phelps does, and given the construction of her play, it's easy to see her point.

The two-actor, intermissionless play at the Victory Theatre, a co-production with the VS. Theatre Company, is all about partnering and unpartnering. Characters look for reasons to couple and stay together. None of the eight men and women we meet (four of each gender, all played by the same two actors) are particularly good company, but since most of us have been part of one "dance" or another, we're supposed to "get" them even if we don't much like them.

Director Ross Kramer emphasizes the "partnership" aspect of his production, even during the scene breaks. Actors Johnny Clark and Robyn Cohen don't simply scamper off to prepare for their next interlude. They're on stage, helping each other dress and undress, move furniture and transfer props. Even when not in character - especially then - the level of trust between these two performers is palpable and lovely to watch. It probably needs to be. As previously stated, the men and women they're playing don't treat each other at all well.

Our first scene, in a hotel room a few hours after a wedding, has a drunk and coked-up bridesmaid named Frances (played, as all the women are, by Cohen) laying into Owen (Clark) the groom, who is Frances' former flame. In the raunchiest language, she berates his bride, Julia, and her circle of friends and family. She demands - and gets - one last fling with Owen. The scene ends with an attempt at tenderness, as Frances asks, "How am I ever going to live without you." Blackout. Scene change. It's half a year later and a sex-starved and cuckolded Julia (Cohen again) makes an aggressive play for her handyman, Kieran (Clark). He's agreeable, but on his own terms.

And on it goes. Frances and Owen both return in later scenes, but with other partners - and !ital!their partners do some intersecting as well. Phelps has undoubtedly seen countryman David Hare's "The Blue Room," the sexual roundelay adaptation of Arthur Schnitzler's "La Ronde" that works a perfect circle. "Modern Dance" isn't quite so evenly structured, and the couplings in Phelps' play aren't quite so icy. But it's close.

The production doesn't get off to a promising start. So much of the first scene's hostility - Cohen's in particular - feels forced and overly choreographed. Frances comes off as such a gutter-mouthed shrew and Owen as such a pathetic weakling that you wonder what either character sees in the other (besides sex appeal, that is). The encounter between Julia and the handyman, Phelps' attempt to trowel in a bit of class investigation, is ham-fisted as well.

But the dance smooths out intriguingly as things progress. Cohen has a knockout scene playing Eleri, one of Owen's flings, in which she delivers only three lines. The rest of the scene is her wordless reactions to Owen's mush-mouthed attempts at self-justification. Clark excels at playing both weak-kneed and loudmouthed characters. His scene as a would-be lothario trying to pick up an intellectual at a bar (which contains a clever but not totally unexpected twist) is skillfully done as well.

Phelps, whose script has likely been updated for American references, has a way with dialogue. Her humor and view of romance may not be as corrosively humorous as, say, Neil LaBute's. "Modern Dance for Beginners" isn't particularly funny, and it's certainly not a play for hopeful romantics. Still, that the play is a pas de deux and not "Modern Gladiators for Beginners" leaves room for a little light. Cohen and Clark supply the rest.

MODERN DANCE FOR BEGINNERS

Where: Victory Theatre, 3324 W. Victory Blvd., Burbank.

When: 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 7 p.m. Sunday; through Dec. 12.

Tickets: $20. Call (323) 850-6045.

In a nutshell: We only hurt the ones we love, part 85,000.---

Evan Henerson, (818) 713-3651 evan.henerson@dailynews.com