Hot and Bothered

The Hothouse at Lantern Theater Co.

by Mark Cofta

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In a timelessly sterile office (set by Meghan Jones, noirishly lit by Janet Embree), blustery Roote (Paul Nolan) banters in Pinter's seductive, repetitive patter with obsequious toady Gibbs (Peter Pryor). As screams, groans and clangs echo through this "rest home" (Christopher Colluci's throbbing sound design sets an eerie tone), even on Christmas Day, Roote and Gibbs puzzle over why patient No. 6457 is dead, and how patient No. 6459 gave birth. "Bear everything in mind!" nonsensically barks Roote, a familiarly despotic bureaucrat surrounded by flunkies vying for his pathetic power.

Such is Luigi Sottile's Lush, a mischievous ass-kisser with a Kramer-esque shock of hair, and Kristyn Chouiniere's Ms. Cutts, a slinky, steely femme fatale twisting men with her undiluted sexual force. Mike Dees' Lamb matches his name, an innocent led to slaughter by his ambitious co-workers.

Kathryn MacMillan's expertly crafted production seems to push the comedy at first, but that just lulls us into false comfort as the struggles within this microcosmic hothouse turn increasingly grotesque — yet still darkly humorous: "What's the matter with this place?" Roote fumes. "Everything's clogged up, bunged up, stuffed up, buggered up." He means the pipes, but Pinter means the people — and if a 50-year-old message about a corrupt bureaucracy collapsing in on itself doesn't feel contemporary, you haven't been paying attention. This isn't the only handbasket hurtling into hell.

Pinter's deliciously devilish conclusion offers no hope, but at least he permits laughter's temporary relief, even as the finale's twist grimly promises that while the names change, the game remains the same.

(m_cofta@citypaper.net)

The Hothouse | Through Oct. 12, Lantern Theater Co., St. Stephen's Theater, 19 S. 10th St., 215-829-0395, lanterntheater.org