‘Dealer’s Choice’ Characters Are Cards, but These Tales Deserve a Full House

Patrick Marber has been compared, often favorably, to David Mamet. That clicks because both know the difference between real talk and stagy talk.

The five London guys in Marber’s “Dealer’s Choice,” vividly produced by Stages Theatre in Fullerton, do prattle on and on. But it’s the kind of gab that sounds so honest and revealing you don’t mind listening in.

And even when Marber, like Mamet, forces things with a glib line to show how clever he can be, it’s just a brief lapse. These blokes have stories to tell and we want to hear them out.

The way Marber sets it up, the most central and profound falls to gambling addict Carl (Scott Damian). Carl has another problem as well--his convoluted relationship with his dad, Steven (Bill Glassman), would have any shrink doing one of those head-spinning “Exorcist” moves.

It’s the old love-hate thing, built on fear, respect and insight. Most of that insight, both for us and Carl and Steven, comes during the heat of a poker game, where father, son and three workers at Steven’s restaurant meet every week. We’ve already been introduced to the cook, Sweeney (Richard Warren) and two waiters, Mugsy (Cody R. Storts) and Frankie (R.C. Ormond), but we’ll learn more later on.

It does take Marber a while to get to the meat of “Dealer’s Choice.” I felt antsy early on as the jokes bounced between Sweeney, a single dad living for a time with his daughter, and Mugsy, whose crackpot plan to turn a public toilet into a restaurant is a touchstone gag. Even the comic punch of Frankie, the silly lady-killer bound for Vegas, takes time to pull us in.

Then enters Ash (Eddie Nickerson) and the scrum is on. By this time, director Steven C. John has found his pace, and so have his actors. At first glance, Ash may be something of a cliche--the mysterious villain who has come to collect a debt and who can evil-stare right through titanium--but Marber soon strips a layer or two. It helps that Nickerson offers the edgiest performance. The paranoia Ash creates provides a psychological anchor and catalyst for this “Dealer’s Choice.”

It gives the cast some nice opportunities. Damian is able to show Carl’s internal storm as he becomes more aware of his ties to his father. He handles the last scene, an uncomfortably sentimental one, with enough understatement to keep it from the bathetic. For the grin factor, begin with Storts. Mugsy may be the group’s doofus mascot, but his unsinkable humor is infectious.

As for the show’s look, the action takes place in two areas, the kitchen in the back and the restaurant (later the basement for poker) in front. Set designer Jason Pendergraft has easily divided the little stage and added details (faded stains on the kitchen walls, a mishmash of small crates in the basement) to complete a picture of authenticity.

“Dealer’s Choice,” Stages Theatre, 400 E. Commonwealth Ave., Fullerton. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 5 p.m. $12 and $15. Ends March 23. (714) 525-4484.