Time Warped

Few playwrights had a better barometric sense of the 1970s emotional climate than Michael Weller, whose “Loose Ends” is a kind of valedictory to a terribly confusing decade. It’s a play where the twenty- and thirtysomething characters will pause, look at each other and ask, “What were we talking about?” That was the ‘70s, all right.

And because “Loose Ends” nails that time so peculiarly well, it also feels stuck there. It’s not, as suggested by actor-director Douglas Carrigan’s revival at Ventura Court Theatre, a work that has expanded and deepened over the years.

This isn’t due to Carrigan and his company not trying. From the smart between-scene song selections (Chicago, Steppenwolf, Joni Mitchell, among others) to Gillean McLeod’s costuming, this is a carefully wrought production happy to slip into the casual pace of Weller’s people and situations. If only they all didn’t seem so petty in the end.

“Loose Ends” traces the entire course of the relationship between Paul (Carrigan) and Susan (Anne Wilde) from their encounter in Bali in 1970 to a post-divorce encounter in Susan’s New Hampshire pad in 1979.

With various friends, co-workers and relatives weaving in and out of scenes and their lives, Paul and Susan allow themselves to be guided by a relaxed aimlessness. They love each other, but each step along the way is wait-see.

While couple Doug and Mariya (a rambunctious Gerald Mccullouch and earthy Evonne Kezios) don’t marry and have kids, and Susan’s friend Janice (effectively spacey Tina Aisner Porter) flits from guy to guy, Susan marries Paul but doesn’t want to slow down her photography career to have babies. Francine Lynn Riber’s Selina is the friend who feels stuck in the middle, confused about what Paul and Susan want.

As much as the play tries to take in the decade (Weller makes a big deal about the Bicentennial, for instance), “Loose Ends” feels curiously cut off from the greater society, suggesting that Paul’s and Susan’s private dilemma is emblematic of some national confusion. (Drugs are barely mentioned, Watergate, Vietnam and Jimmy Carter never.)

But neither the writing nor Carrigan’s and Wilde’s performances provide the needed depth and energy to make these characters command our attention and stand for a decade. The larger drama here eventually feels so small and inevitable--we know Paul and Susan can’t last together--that we merely ponder along with Weller why they can’t see it themselves. Thus, the joys here are in the details, like Edmund Wyson’s delicious double-performance as Janice’s two lovers.

* “Loose Ends,” Ventura Court Theatre, 12417 Ventura Blvd., Studio City. 8 p.m. Fridays-Sundays. Ends Aug. 17. $15. (213) 466-1767.