CHAIN.LINK.FENCE

by David Anthony Fox

Perhaps the adults-only warning should come first: CHAIN. LINK. FENCE. features explicit homosexuality and copious frontal nudity.

Personally, I enjoyed both. Philly has surprisingly few companies that focus on gay theater, so another is welcome. And the actors -- of varying ages and shapes -- handle their nakedness with such astonishing poise and comfort that we in the audience relax, too.

CHAIN, a new play by Chuck Cannon, is based on Arthur Schnitzler’s Reigen (better known as La Ronde), in which five men and five women from across the class spectrum have a sequence of sexual affairs: A sleeps with B, B with C and so on. Reigen, a masterpiece from fin-de-siècle Vienna, is a coruscating vision. It punctures the very notion of romance. More specifically, sexual relations detonate the class system.

It’s clever to re-imagine Reigen as a contemporary gay play, as CHAIN does, though it means the structure necessarily will emphasize the now-unwelcome cliche of the one-night stand. So here, Joe sleeps with Steve, Steve with Tom, etc., etc.

What’s not clear, though, is precisely what point Cannon wants to make. Sometimes it appears that CHAIN is after an agenda of social critique that is analogous to Reigen’s. There are, for example, some provocative moments that underscore the cruel way a beautiful young man treats a fading middle-aged one.

But the seriousness of the topic is undercut by a script that favors a barrage of single entendres ("I thought 'Han Solo’ meant he jerked off a lot") and general sex talk ("I shot all over your Anne Klein sheets"), and has the vaguely embarrassing feel of softcore-porn-movie dialogue. (By the way, it’s Calvin Klein -- not Anne -- who makes the bed linens. I may be past my barfly days, but I do know my upscale housewares.)

Perhaps Cannon’s point is eroticism … or bawdy humor? But again, it doesn’t seem like the right fit, particularly since the playwright has also directed CHAIN (sidebar: Cannon appears as an actor, too), and the acting -- by a likeable ensemble with varying degrees of talent -- emphasizes quiet earnestness rather than comic élan. (Another sidebar: I have no idea what the title means.)

So it’s a mixed bag, one that doesn’t quite satisfy, but offers some incidental pleasures along the way (well, some things will please some audiences, certainly!). And as I said at the beginning, it’s nice to add another gay-themed play to the Philly theater season.

CHAIN. LINK. FENCE.

Through Nov. 21, Living End Theatre Company at the Playground at the Adrienne, 2030 Sansom St., 215-563-4330