Lively women propel festive family saga

Brian Friel's "Dancing at Lughnasa" doesn't have any dancing in it, nor any depiction of Lughnasa, a pagan Irish festival that celebrates the harvest with wine, revelry and precious little inhibition.

Instead, mere references to this rite of passion are enough to convey the essence of its message that life is for the living Ñ which, of course, is also the theme of the play.

University Players have given Friel's 1992 Tony Award winner for best play a stellar treatment. "Dancing at Lughnasa" is set in 1936 in rural Ireland, but this fine, rollicking character study is universal enough to touch and entertain anyone with close family members and a few mixed feelings about them.

Adult narrator Michael (Tyler Dilts) begins the play by introducing five women who were integral parts of his childhood: Maggie (Lisa Costanza), Kate (Jennifer Branson Fowler), Agnes (De Anne Sbardellati), Rose (Joan Maurer) and Michael's mother Chris (Jessica McNeil).

The women are close but rarely encounter adventure in their lives. Stories of Lughnasa, however, arouse evident desire in all but spinster-like Kate, the wet blanket of the bunch.

In good time we also meet Michael's runaway father Jack (William Morris) and his long-departed uncle Gerry (Ryan Lee).

The latter has just spent 30 years in Uganda and can no longer competently speak his native tongue of English, just as the women have lost the ability to speak the language of dance.

The women and their genuine interaction carry the play. These are superb actresses. Each performance leaves its own special mark, but for me Joan Maurer stole the play. Fiery as a blowtorch, Maurer's Rose brims with the very spirit of youth and vigor Lughnasa promises.

A tomboy who looks great in a dress, Rose offers a sharp contrast to the four other women in the play. From Fowler's enjoyable approximation of Katherine Hepburn to Costanza's turn as an eccentric aunt who behaves more like a teen-age sister, they represent varied degrees of suppressed emotion.

Much about the rest of the production was merely acceptable. This includes scenic designer Jason Foreman's understated set and Dilts' wan reading as Michael. Cursed with a fading cadence, his lines come out sounding like a mid-rate Robert F. Kennedy impersonation. The play's ending is also a bit abrupt, lacking dramatic closure.

That was a minor nuisance, however. The women of "Dancing at Lughnasa" are its real stars. Spending an evening with them might even inspire you to call a neglected aunt or sibling just to hear their voice.

"Dancing at Lughnasa" runs through Nov. 4 in the Cal Rep Theater. Performances are Wednesday through Saturday with a 6 p.m. curtain on all Wednesday shows. All other performances begin at 8 p.m. A matinee on Saturday, Oct. 8, will begin at 2 p.m.

Tickets are $10. For more information, one may call (310) 985-7000.