‘Lula’ a Hard-Edged Look at Fading Rockers

Early rocker Eddie Cochran died in an auto accident in 1960. He was 21. That’s how legends are created-- old rockers just fade away.

Playwright Rex Weiner re-creates, in “Be Bop a Lula” at Theatre/Theater, one night a few weeks before the fatal crash, when Cochran and his best friend Gene Vincent checked into an English village hotel. It was the night Cochran foresaw his death. The guitarist’s prescience is at the solid core of Weiner’s drama, along with the strong bonding between good guy Cochran and bad boy Vincent.

“Be Bop” is a cautionary tale of sorts, following its protagonists on their downward slide as their decade ends and pop styles veer away from their R&B-oriented; music. It asks questions about being on the road and whether a falling star can get off the road and settle down. It looks as though Cochran might make it. Vincent is as addicted to the lifestyle as he is to booze and birds and pills.

It’s an engrossing visit with the duo as they wait for two girls from the pub downstairs. Donal Logue’s Cochran is a simple kid, his feet fairly earthbound as he gazes out the window, listening to the wind and sea whisper hints of his fate. As Vincent, Paul Hipp is kinetic and unstrung.

The performances are commanding under Jeff Murray’s hard-edged direction. Kerry David and Paulene Smith have the right naive anxiety as young women thrilled at meeting the guys.

John Mueller also gives a creditable performance as the spirit of Buddy Holly, who is actually the devil, in Cochran’s nightmare after the revelry. That nightmare is the only jarring note in Weiner’s script, almost as if it’s from another play. Although Murray makes it flash with theatricality, the devil’s and Vincent’s dueling guitars vying for Cochran’s soul are less accomplished than they should be.

“Be Bop a Lula,” Theatre/Theater, 1713 Cahuenga Blvd., Hollywood. Thursdays-Fridays, 8 p.m. Ends May 22. $15; (213) 466-1767. Running time: 1 hour, 45 minutes.

Bright One-Acts in ‘Desperate Pleasures’

Interact Theatre Company’s first resident production at the long-dark Theatre Exchange, “Desperate Pleasures,” is feather-light, but good-humored and very nicely produced.

Of the three one-acts that comprise the evening, Laura Maria Censabella’s “The Doll” and Bill McNulty’s “An Expiring Actor” are little more than television sketches, but performances are bright and funny.

“The Doll” has Peter Zapp as an introverted music copyist who is dining by candlelight with his new girlfriend--yes, an inflatable doll delivered that day. Enough said.

Merrily macabre is the terminally ill actor in McNulty’s inside joke about a sleazy agent who needs his client’s signature on a contract for a co-starring role in a new two-character movie. The only problem is the role is that of a corpse, and the actor has to die before shooting starts in seven days. Zapp’s desperation for even this casting is every Hollywood actor’s desperation, and James Harper’s oily 10-percenter is priceless.

The production’s highlight is Ethan Phillips’ “Penguin Blues,” about two troubled souls forced to spend time communicating as part of their therapy at a substance abuse rehab center. The dialogue is witty and insightful and delivered with an honesty that hits all the right notes. Here Zapp is a voice-over actor at odds with a nun who is into heavy denial, played by Helen Duffy. Their journey from sharp humor to eventual, tearful bonding is seamless under director Paul Collins.

“Desperate Pleasures,” Theatre Exchange, 11855 Hart St., North Hollywood. Fridays, 8 p.m.; Saturdays, 2 & 5 p.m.; Sundays, 3 p.m. Ends May 17. $10; (213) 466-1767. Running time: 2 hours.

Mostly Misses in ‘Deb & Dan’s Show’

Dan Castellaneta and Deb Lacusta can be very funny. She has an impish irreverence, and he a voice that can capture telltale nuances in a variety of disguises (he is the voice of Homer Simpson).

The material they have written for their “Deb & Dan’s Show” at Santa Monica Airport’s Club Lux doesn’t come up to their performing of it. Most of it is cliched and looks very familiar, even under Vince Waldron’s compact direction, from a Texas couple being obnoxious in a Las Vegas bar, to a misfired sketch about a dreadful boor who channels through Deb, to a silly duet by childish radio therapists. There are few big laughs.

In “For Love or Money,” they almost strike pay dirt. He’s an insurance man who stumbles into a piece of performance art by a vaporlike poet, who’s taken aback that anyone stayed to see her work. It has style that comes from humor based in character, rather than one-liners, and echoes some of the brightness of early Nichols & May.

“Deb & Dan’s Show,” Club Lux, Santa Monica Airport. Thursdays, 8 p.m. Ends June 4. $12.50; (310) 288-7882. Running time: 1 hour,35 minutes.

‘Heavy Mental’ a Lightweight Evening

Critic Alec Reid once said that Samuel Beckett’s work presents “the thing itself, not something about the thing.” Don Paul, who performs the three pieces that make up “Heavy Mental” at the Tamarind Theatre, and director Louis Fantasia, haven’t caught on to that admonition.

Paul never gets inside any of the words, sounding most of the time as if he’s reciting and, on opening night, stumbling over lines.

Beckett’s “Krapp’s Last Tape,” in which an old man refuses to recognize his young self on an old tape, has Paul in a gray wig plopped on like a hat, and in what looks uncomfortably like clown makeup. It all denies Beckett’s supreme sense of reality.

“Bobby Is Alive, and . . . Well, Directing Traffic,” by Dana Gorbea-Leon, is a story told directly to the audience, about the protagonist’s friendship with a street person who knows all the bus schedules and spews them out to passers-by. When Paul becomes Bobby, his debt is to Dustin Hoffman in “Rain Man.”

Lanford Wilson’s “Days Ahead” is a strange little piece in an even stranger evening that doesn’t ever get as heavy or as mental as it hopes.

“Heavy Mental,” Tamarind Theatre, 5919 Franklin Ave., Hollywood. Mondays-Wednesdays, 8 p.m. Ends May 13. $12-$15; (213) 660-8587. Running time: 1 hour, 40 minutes.

Lack of Shading Mars Version of ‘Requiem’

Rod Serling’s classic television drama, “Requiem for a Heavyweight,” remains a TV script on stage. It’s inclined to ramble, even with Peter Goodman’s clever fold-out set providing efficient scene changes at Company of Angels.

Jenifer Parker’s direction doesn’t help. Tempos are slow, without much attention to the shading of rhythms that would build tension, and crowd scenes look improvised on the spot.

Some performances rise above it all. The sensitivity at the base of Glen Lutz’s “Mountain” McClintock is touching, and gives his performance a defined strength. As the only woman who has seen beyond his battered face to the simple man within, Carol Huth is exactly on target.

Other scenes that mine the power in the writing involve Art La Fleur as Mountain’s manager and Paul Michael as his trainer. They maintain the two-fisted stance the genre needs, but which this production generally lacks.

“Requiem for a Heavyweight,” Company of Angels, 2106 Hyperion Ave., Silverlake. Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m. Ends May 16. $10-$12; (213) 466-1767. Running time:2 hours, 30 minutes.