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Here’s a conundrum for you. When watching local theater productions, do you look past the rough parts that plague most plays and give the company a break? Or do you hope for a higher level of performance that can be found in other small theater productions?  

If you opt for the first choice, you may want to check out Theater Absurd’s inaugural production of “Death,” by Woody Allen. However, if you’re hoping for a diamond-in-the-rough of a play from a new theater group, you’d better keep looking – at least for now.  

“Death” is chock full of themes reminiscent throughout all of Allen’s work: love, alienation, a quest for spiritual understanding, what the universe is all about (according to a hooker), and of course, what happens after we die. And though the title may put you off, it is actually a Woody Allen comedy. (And for those of you put off by Woody Allen, it is only a one-act play.) It’s filled with some great one-liners and situations that are pure Allen. 

You have to give the cast of “Death” credit for trying to pull off a long, forgotten play by Allen, though you may have seen a variation on this play in Allen’s movie “Shadows and Fog.” The production, which runs through this weekend, has some great comic moments. But it is somewhat fraught with rushed performances and parts that don’t quite make sense. 

The piece centers around the main character, named Kleinman, played by Geoff Roelants, and his attempts to grasp a bizarre reality that one, a homicidal maniac is trolling his neighborhood, and two, some of his friends think that he may be the killer. Played with high energy, Roelants is a decent Allen-type, replete with the nebbish whining, tics and perplexed rants that help push the play through its quick 45-minute run.  

Kleinman is a salesman of some kind—we’re never told of what, but just that it’s “the height of the season.” One morning he is awoken at 2:30 a.m. by three of his friends who are dressed like the musical group The Village People – a construction worker, a sailor and a cowboy. These costumes are never really explained, though Kleinman makes a joke when he mimics the YMCA dance while asking if they’re all going to go out dancing. This must be one of the “absurd” parts of Theater Absurd. 

Kleinman is pulled and pushed by his friends to get up and join a vigilante group they’re forming to find the killer. While never told why he is needed or what the “plan” is, Kleinman nevertheless follows his friends’ lead out into the night. One by one, most of his friends and others he encounters on the street – a doctor, a hooker and a police officer – are either killed or are in on the plan to find the killer.  

The problem for Kleinman is that no one describes the plan to him. When he asks, he can’t get a straight answer. This dilemma slowly eats away at the small string Kleinman holds on reality.  

The characters surrounding Kleinman, who could resemble the characters on an episode of Bob Newhart, are perfect at causing mass confusion in the life of Kleinman. During a few moments they even think that Klein 

man is the killer.  

Two notable characters who shed a little light on the whole scene are a hooker and Abe – an orthodox Jew or Rabbi, you’re not sure which. (What would a Woody Allen play be without a hooker and a orthodox Jew?)