STAGE REVIEWS : Pacific’s ‘Alice’ Fails to Adapt

The pace of its development having speeded up a lot lately, the Pacific Theatre Ensemble can be counted on for one thing: not to repeat itself, not these days.

It has expanded, acquiring a new space adjacent to the old one on Venice Boulevard in Venice. And it has gone from the large-cast degeneracies of “The Beggar’s Opera� (its last production, which the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle showered with five awards) into something much more restrained: a three-play Sampler Series that began last weekend with an adaptation of an adaptation: the Andre Gregory version of Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland.�

This means we get Carroll’s “Alice� third-hand: first as transmogrified by Gregory and the Manhattan Project in 1970--and in the here-and-now, considerably sanitized by director Stephanie Shroyer and her seven-member ensemble, one more player than Gregory used.

The results? Mixed.

Gregory’s piece, unseen by this writer, is described in the “Best Plays� annual as “part comedy and part psychological terror tale.� There is no terror here. This group version of “Alice� qualifies as family fare. But for which members of the family? Any child younger than 6 would find its minimalist techniques too hard to track while adults may find it entirely too tame. There is no happy medium and certainly no edge.

Gregory, who won a Drama Desk Award for his direction of “Alice,� placed a strong signature on his work. But Shroyer’s “Alice� is much more white bread--nontoxic and driven entirely by non-pollutant energy. Alice, played with committed intensity by Lela Ivey, is a nervous girl, but not more so than any other frightened child. The Dormouse doesn’t turn your stomach by stuffing her face at the tea party (as she reportedly did in the Gregory version); she’s just a messy eater. There is no need to adhere to the Gregory staging, but if one does, it should be more than a half-hearted gesture.

Along the way, there is the consumption of suspect magical mushrooms, some rapping, a sly pilfering of the theme from “Chariots of Fire�--all adult semi-jokes--but no new techniques, nothing, except Humpty Dumpty’s fall, to make you really sit up and take notice. So why do the piece?

For the change of pace, yes, and to give the actors the workout. In addition to Ivey, they are, alphabetically: Bill Evans, Patrick Fabian, Suzanne Ford, Darren Modder, Patricia Sherick and Dan Verdin. With only a handful of props and their talent, all do fine jobs in multiple roles. But the form is overused and their abundant energy not enough to keep one’s interest from flagging. Even at 90 minutes, this “Alice� starts to drag.

This is not a request for slavish fealty to the Gregory version or the Gregory point of view. But it is a request for a clearer purpose. If Shroyer has a vision, she is not sharing it. And despite Alice’s early proclamation that, “Oh dear, oh dear, how queer everything is today,� everything is not nearly queer enough. One would welcome a PTE edition of the Carroll story that simply lived up to the intentions cited in the program notes.

This one is not it.

* “Alice in Wonderland,� Pacific Theatre Ensemble, 707 Venice Blvd., Venice. Thursday-Sunday, 8 p.m. Reopens May 4, to run in repertory with “When Will I Dance?� (opening April 11) and “Aliens� (opening May 16) in May and June. Ends June 15. $12 (children younger than 12: $6); (213) 466-1767. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.