'WILD' DOESN'T BEGIN TO DESCRIBE THIS 'PARTY'.

Byline: Evan Henerson Theater Critic

LIKE THE vaudeville dancer Queenie who anticipates - and delivers - a fete of Bacchanalian proportions, Blank Theatre Company artistic director Daniel Henning has pulled out every imaginable stop for his production of ``The Wild Party.'' Not exactly an evening of breezy fun, this seamy musical by Michael John LaChiusa and George C. Wolfe is every bit a feat. Of staging, of casting and certainly of ambition.

The Blank, for those of you unfamiliar with it, is a 15-year-old Hollywood company run by Henning and former ``ER''-er Noah Wyle. The group operates out of a sub-99-seat theater along Santa Monica Boulevard's theater row, although for ``The Wild Party,'' they're working at the Hudson Mainstage a few blocks down. If the move means room for even one more dresser, then that's a maneuver well-plotted.

Set designer Aaron Francis has made careful use of every square inch of the Hudson's single-set stage, populating Queenie's tight little flat with chairs, a bit of cabinetry and a separate opening for her bedroom. Here, alas, is where tight quarters require compromises. Queenie's is a single bed, and ain't no way this particular blonde (Valarie Pettiford) spends her nights alone.

One night, she and vaudeville clown lover Burrs (Eric Anderson) decide to throw a party, break out the contraband gin (we're in Prohibition-era New York) and invite everybody they know, love and hate to come and get wild. On the guest list are a fighter (James Black) and his flapper wife (Julie Dixon Jackson), a pair of performing brothers (Nathan Lee Graham and Daren E. Herbert), an aging performer (Sally Kellerman) and a couple of Jewish producers (Peter van Norden and Michael Kostroff) who might give Burrs a leg up.

The story, based on a 1928 poem by Joseph Moncure March, is told largely through narrative song - and not the kind that contains easily digested verses or choruses. Music director- pianist David O. and his five-piece band are right there on stage and every bit part of the action. At one point, Sally (Daisy Eagan), a zonked-out Bohemian's date, falls asleep under the piano. And that's about as tame as the evening gets.

Pettiford, who can infuse every snatch of sung dialogue with a different degree of attitude, does much of the heavy lifting. Graham and Herbert as the narrating D'Armano brothers are charming and occasionally menacing. Kellerman lights her numbers with a torch just because it's her bourbon-y voice that's singing them. Jane Lanier's choreography is pitch perfect for a stage of this size, particularly in a frenzied explosion at the end of a number titled - appropriately - ``Wild.''

There are also a pair of performances so arresting and at such radically opposing ends of the effectiveness spectrum that it's stunning they're part of the same evening. As Burrs, who, in the right hands might possess slithery charisma, Anderson is so demonically over the top that the stage threatens to self-destruct around him. He mugs, he slobbers, he prances, monkey-boy like; it's almost a sick homage to the worst shenanigans of Jim Carrey.

Then there's Eagan, playing a character who spends the better part of the evening drunk, high or unconscious. She gives, hands down, the most believable rendering of an inebriate that I have ever witnessed. Barely uttering a single word (although she does sing - topless, no less), Eagan shows through her eyes, her slumped helplessness and a kind of anonymous ``who am I and how did I get here?'' terror everything that LaChiusa and Wolfe are looking to convey about these lowlifes and their mean little dreams.

It's the shining light of an already grungily sparkling evening.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

THE WILD PARTY - Three and one half stars

Where: Hudson Mainstage Theatre, 6539 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood.

When: 8 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday, 2 and 7 p.m. Sunday; through Nov. 20.

Tickets: $25 to $40. [phone], www.TheBlank.com.

In a nutshell: Amid Michael John LaChiusa's jangly jazz, Daisy Eagan demonstrates that near silence is golden.

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Photo:

Queenie (Valarie Pettiford) has a soft spot for her vaudeville clown lover, Burrs (Eric Anderson), in ``The Wild Party.''