An uneven ‘Man of La Mancha’

Rude Guerrilla Theater Company christens its new venue with a flamenco-flavored revision of “Man of La Mancha,” the company’s first musical. In taking on Dale Wasserman, Joe Darion and Mitch Leigh’s Tony-winning adaptation of Miguel de Cervantes, the provocative Santa Ana troupe produces results both impressive and frustrating.

Designer Dawn Hess provides a detailed Spanish Inquisition prison setting, beautifully lighted by Jeremy Ojeda. We enter while a prologue accompanied by invaluable guitarists Andres Cartagena and Taha Yazdandoust is underway, the ensemble as resourceful as Kathleen Hotmer’s costume design is inventive.

Cervantes (Jonathon Talmadge) arrives with his servant (Cliff Peddicord) and is greeted by a kangaroo court of fellow prisoners, to whom he proposes an enactment of his “Don Quixote” before he faces the Grand Inquisitor upstairs.

Director Robert M. Tully, choreographer Michael Lopez and company do yeoman work. Quixote’s niece (Trina Mendiola), housekeeper (Jessica Woodard), priest (Norman Wilson) and nemesis (Justin Radford) make “I’m Only Thinking of Him” a tickling standout. As harlot Aldonza, musical director Melinda Messenger is fierce -- Faith Prince meets Joan Allen.

However, the intimate concept has not located the property’s duality. The requisite sense of overarching tyrannical menace comes and goes, while the division between reality and charade is fuzzy. The choral sound at the finale is gorgeous, but its jazz harmonies emerge from nowhere, and the intermission inserted after the explicitly graphic rape of Aldonza is ill advised.

Talmadge, vocally decent and sincere, proves less stirring than sturdy as Cervantes and far too rational as Quixote. Peddicord offers surface shtick and an inexplicable Italian accent. They typify the imbalance of a noteworthy but problematic effort.

-- David C. Nichols

“Man of La Mancha,” Rude Guerrilla Theater Company, 200 N. Broadway, Santa Ana. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2:30 p.m. Sundays. Also, 8 p.m. Thursdays, April 6 and 13 only. Ends April 15. Nudity and violence. $25. (714) 547-4688. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.

A ‘Voice’ true to radio’s early days

“It’s a strange world when a wooden box can pull ghosts out of the sky.” Such is the sense of wide-eyed wonder that greets the dawn of broadcast radio in John Olive’s 1987 play, “The Voice of the Prairie.” Theatre Neo’s production captures the spirit of this affectionate salute to an America of simpler times, though a large cast varies widely in doing justice to Olive’s rich characters.

It’s shades of Professor Harold Hill meets Garrison Keillor in 1923, when wily traveling radio salesman Leon Schwab (Howard S. Miller) sets up a makeshift one-room studio to help sell his radios to rural Nebraskans. In desperate need of content, Leon transforms David Quinn (David St. James), a shy farmer with a knack for storytelling, into one of the first stars of the fledgling medium.

Quinn captivates his listeners with riveting tales of his adventures in 1895 as a vagabond teen (David Garry in flashbacks) -- disappearing with his girlfriend, a plucky blind runaway named Frankie (Ali Burns), “into the vastness of a young nation.”

Their journey ended in abrupt separation, and Frankie’s unknown fate fuels the poignancy -- and dramatic tension -- of the story.

The action alternates between the time periods, building to an inevitable reunion between the older David and Frances (Jacquelyn Riggs), now a schoolteacher in Arkansas. Their meeting is charmingly awkward and fraught with trepidation, a wry reflection of the gulf between romantic ideals and daily life.

The performers have the right look, helped by Tina Zarro’s period costumes, but some characters lack key qualities -- St. James requires us to take David’s skills as a mesmerizing raconteur on faith, and Miller’s Leon is a bit low-key for an ambitious entrepreneur. Burns and Riggs have more success in fully defining Frankie’s eccentric appeal.

Replete with music and songs of the era, Wendy Worthington’s staging inventively employs idle cast members as sound effect artists to help tell the story. Executed with precision timing, this is an elegant and thematically appropriate approach that, like an old-time radio show, actively engages the imagination.

-- Philip Brandes

“The Voice of the Prairie,” Secret Rose Theatre, 11246 Magnolia Blvd., North Hollywood. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Ends April 29. $20. (323) 769-5858 or www.lastagetix.com. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes.

The last days for

a ‘city of mirrors’

As the city faces its final hours, its residents go on as before, the rich escaping into one final delusion of power while everyone else bears up against the usual exhaustion and frustration. The place is called Tarquinz, but viewers might come to think of this “city of mirrors,” as it is described, as Los Angeles. Or perhaps Washington, D.C.

Presented with a nod to the musical “Cabaret,” Ziggurat Theatre Ensemble’s “The Last Days of Tarquinz” is a series of allegorical skits, dances and clown routines, all presided over by a master of ceremonies. None of the nine scenes -- dreamed up by a company that devotes itself to world myths and ritual -- comes right out and announces what it’s about, but each offers a glimpse of humankind in all its yearning, curious, jealous, conflicted complexity.

The piece was written and directed by company artistic director Stephen Legawiec, with input from the ensemble. The 10 performers wear white makeup that seems to be both clown paint and mask. Nearly all of their movement, coached by Dana Wieluns, is stylized, with several numbers evolving into full-on modern, flamenco or other dances.

In one wordless scene, twin figures in matching gray suits enact a mirror dance that, we come to realize, is a metaphor for people locked into a routine. When one of the figures falls out of step, she realizes that life needn’t be so regimented and heads out the door to savor living before it’s too late.

We are never told why Tarquinz has reached its last day, and we are never sure whether this enactment of its final hours -- in an intermissionless 90 minutes -- is meant as a cautionary tale or as a meditation on what civilizations leave behind. This can be frustrating, but it can also be liberating if, like the mirror twin, we manage to break free of routine expectations.

-- Daryl H. Miller

“The Last Days of Tarquinz,” [Inside] the Ford, 2580 Cahuenga Blvd. East, Hollywood. Next week: Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 8 p.m. In repertory with Zoo District presentations. For full schedule, see www.ZigguratTheatre.org. Ends April 30. $20. (323) 461-3673. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.

Getting back into the dating scene

Men should be careful about getting involved with female comics. If the relationship goes awry, the woman in question just might recycle the experience into comedy material.

For Judi Lee Brandwein, payback is sweet. Twenty years ago, Brandwein married her college sweetheart and had a couple of kids in short order. When her dysfunctional marriage finally fell apart, she found herself treading water in the singles scene.

Brandwein’s marriage was no picnic, as becomes evident in “Fornicationally Challenged,” her solo show at the Hudson Guild. And certainly she doesn’t hesitate to take a few satisfying shots at her Neanderthal ex. Mostly, however, she’s more concerned with chronicling her painful, funny segue from monogamy and motherhood into serial dating.

How times have changed. Brandwein’s trenchant account is most amusing when it details just how much society -- and men -- have evolved in the intervening decades. With two grown children, she has hit the snooze button on her biological clock. However, the men she encounters are frankly obsessed with settling down and reproducing -- a refreshing role reversal that makes for the show’s funniest moments

Director and developer Mark Travis keeps the pacing focused and crisp, and Brandwein, an attractive performer, gets her share of big laughs. In the debit column, her portrayal of a chain-smoking best friend could have been lifted directly from a “Simpsons” rerun, and her decision to close her show with a tired Howard Cosell imitation seems misguided.

Brandwein should consider switching back into her own persona for the denouement, perhaps even sharing serious lessons learned from her experiences. As it is, her slight but charming entertainment ends on an unnecessarily negligible note.

-- F. Kathleen Foley

“Fornicationally Challenged,” Hudson Guild, 6539 Santa Monic a Blvd., Hollywood. 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays. Ends April 9. $15 and $20. (323) 960-7721 or www.plays411.com/challenged. Running time: 1 hour, 10 minutes.