Slow Dancing to a Trio

LONG BEACH — William Hanley’s 1964 drama “Slow Dance on the Killing Ground” seems a little dated 33 years later, not only in its treatment of some serious problems, but also in its style.

It comes from an era when it was common to bring characters with exactly the right woes to a secluded spot where they can work out those woes through each other and simultaneously within themselves. In this case, Hanley has three characters with distinct secrets, concerning the Holocaust, matricide and abortion.

Glas (Matt Bond) is an aging concentration-camp survivor who claims he is not a Jew. At opening, he is taking inventory in his lonely, isolated candy store somewhere in darkest Brooklyn. Suddenly the door bangs open, and Randall (James N. Gordon), a young black man, rushes in, glancing back outside for those on his trail.

The cat-and-mouse game that ensues lets us know, in lengthy monologues, something about them. But the game is interrupted when a young woman named Rosie (Michelle Brooks) dashes in and faints. After being revived, her monologue explains how she became pregnant and why marriage is not an option.

In the very early ‘60s, “The Umbrella Man” terrorized New York City’s West Side. He wore a derby, a cape and carried an umbrella with a deadly, sharpened tip. He was intelligent but pretended not to be. Clearly, he was Hanley’s prototype for Randall, whose breezy street argot disappears when he removes his dark shades. We can hear his 187 I.Q. in his lucid, wise dialogue.

Randall is obviously Gordon’s role. He has taken hold of it and turned it into almost a ritual of terrorism and self-debasement. It’s a true picture of a lost young man whose brilliance has tricked him into an act of savage violence.

Gordon’s volatile treatment of the role is beautifully balanced with Bond’s nicely underplayed Glas, whose anger at Randall’s games simmers beneath a sham authority. Especially in his long monologue explaining the lie of his life, Bond has a strength that can only come from inner control.

As Rosie, Brooks is also strong. Like the others, she doesn’t attempt a New York accent, which belies her line about the way New Yorkers talk, but she embodies Rosie’s mixture of naivete and wisdom and her sense of hopelessness.

Director Gregory Cohen took a cue from the title, guiding this trio’s simplistic dance just slowly enough to reinforce the feeling of isolation in a cruel world. He might have goosed some of the inner rhythms within particular scenes, but he has given Hanley’s antiquated script the look and feel it needs. This is a play that would fall apart if updated.

BE THERE

“Slow Dance on the Killing Ground,” Long Beach Studio Theatre, 5021 E. Anaheim St. Friday-Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday and July 13, 2 p.m. Ends July 19. $12-$15. (562) 494-1616. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.