STAGE BEAT : Passions Smolder in ‘Why Things Burn’

Imagine the tawdry little circus in the musical “Carousel” minus the puppets and the music. There’s a strong man, a sexy trick rider, a fire eater, a razor eater, a runaway and, peculiar to this circus, a voracious lesbian casting lady--but no less voracious than anybody else.

They’ve just disbanded on the outskirts of L.A. and personify “Why Things Burn,” by Ric Krause at the Road Theatre Company in Sun Valley.

The fire eater (the impressive Dan Butler) is a crazed Holocaust survivor obsessed with the trick pony rider (Susan Rome) who betrays her strong man (Richard Vidan) for the blandishments of the shark-like Hollywood casting lady (the avaricious Taylor Gilbert).

But none of them is operatic as in soap. Actions are too off-center and dark for that. Passions simmer and smolder; bodies, like sticks of firewood, pop into flame and burn up (literally).

The acting is attuned to the edginess of the play and countered by the different harmonies of a smooth narrator (Robert M. Duncan) and a likable runaway youth (Karl David).

With spare circus props (but no circus acts), director Jan Lewis creates a mood uncannily close to the entertainment underclass and desperadoes of Nathanael West’s “The Day of the Locust”--topped off by a holocaust that reminds you of West’s painting come-to-life, “L.A. Burning.”

* “Why Things Burn,” Road Theatre Company, 10741 Sherman Way, Sun Valley. Thursdays-Sundays, 8 p.m. Ends Dec. 20. $12. (818) 764-5363. Running time: 1 hour, 40 minutes .