'UNEXPECTED' DELIGHTS EACH ACTOR GETS SOMETHING DIFFERENT FROM NEW STAGE PRODUCTION.

At the Geffen Playhouse, performers Christopher Lloyd and Holland Taylor are playing out their own version of ``Strangers on a Train.'' Except in the scenario imagined by playwright Yasmina Reza, the man and woman sharing a railway compartment on a journey from Paris to Frankfurt aren't thinking about murder, and for the bulk of their 80-minute encounter they don't speak a word to each other, even though they're the only two people in the room.

High drama? Perhaps not, but beware of underestimating Reza. Before she wrote ``The Unexpected Man'' - which opens tonight at the Geffen Playhouse - the French playwright/actress spun theatrical gold out of ``Art,'' the story of three friends arguing over a blank white canvas.

``Art'' fanciers can expect something very different say the two actors.

``It's a very unusual piece,'' admits Lloyd. ``It's one of those pieces of writing that really goes a long ways with layers that are there to be covered. The demands are kind of unusual. I don't know how easily it would fit into stock theater.''

``Stylistically, it's a real challenge,'' agrees Taylor in a separate interview. ``At the invited dress rehearsal, both Chris and I were looking a little wall-eyed. wondering, 'Is this plane going to fly?' You can't tell. We had no idea, and I haven't felt that way in recent memory.''

Lloyd plays a well-known author and Taylor is a woman who, unbeknownst to the author, loves his work. She even has a copy of his latest novel in her handbag, but doesn't have the courage to pull it out and start reading. Nor can she work up the guts to start a conversation.

Over a series of lengthy monologues which serve to illustrate the characters' thoughts, the man spews out bitterness over his sex life, his daughter, his career and anything else that's giving him a mental toothache. The woman, meanwhile, wrestles with a different set of issues.

The two characters don't speak until the final 10 minutes. Taylor compares the scenario to having two one-person shows taking place on the same stage. ``The Surreal Disconnected Paris to Frankfurt Monologues'' anybody?

Christopher Hampton, the British playwright who translated ``The Unexpected Man'' from French, calls the play ``a much more poetic and personal play than 'Art.' Yasmina doesn't take a great theme and shake it down. This arose from an incident in her life where she followed a writer she enormously admired, but never managed to get the courage to speak to him. The play arose out of that.''

What kind of a collaborator is Reza? ``Exacting. Extremely particular,'' says Hampton. ``With 'Unexpected Man,' she was more relaxed. I think she likes it better as a play.''

And if ever there were an argument for writers block, here it is: according to Hampton, Reza got stuck while working on ``The Unexpected Man.'' So, giving herself a break, she wrote ``Art'' which went on to have more than 90 professional productions and became the most frequently produced play in the United States last year.

The first English-language production of ``The Unexpected Man'' received decent acclaim in London. An ofroadway production garnered strong notices for co-stars Eileen Atkins and Alan Bates. ``Intimate yet deeply stirring, dry but surprisingly juicy, unsentimental yet ultimately so full of suspense and emotional payoff that we feel giddy from the release,'' Linda Winer wrote in Newsday.

Taylor and Lloyd are the first Americans to play the roles. And they now know what their British and French predecessors had to contend with - endless studying of lengthy passages, near-rants for Lloyd, introspection for Taylor.

Attacking the speeches took Lloyd back to his days at the Yale Repertory Theater in the early 1970s, when he acted in a version of Dostoevsky's ``The Possessed'' by famed Polish director Andrzej Wajda.

``I played a character who had a speech about twice as long as the one that opens this play,'' Lloyd recalls of the production which also featured a then-unknown Meryl Streep. ``I was less experienced and very intimidated by the material. The character was in a tirade for, like, three pages, just spewing. It was followed by another emotionally heightened scene, and it concluded with an epileptic fit.''

Lloyd laughs. ``It was a challenge,'' he says.

Reza's work comes with its own obstacles, says Taylor, not the least of which is keeping your place.

``Boy, you better not let your mind wander for one moment,'' said Taylor, who won an Emmy award for a recurring role as a randy judge on ABC's ``The Practice.'' ``Some of these sentences go on for 10 lines, and they're filled with parenthetical remarks and sub-clauses. If you get lost or misplace a verb, you can't find your way back in.

Both actors are stage veterans who have spent recent years on film and TV. Taylor will play Nancy Reagan in the Showtime film ``The Day Reagan Was Shot,'' premiering in December, and the upcoming film ``Homeroom.'' She was scheduled to do some another ``Practice'' stint, but the scheduling of the play conflicted.

Not that she's griping. From practically the first line, Taylor said the play hooked her.

``I accepted before I even got to page 10,'' she said. ``I called my agent and said, 'I haven't even finished it. Just say yes.' It's wonderfully hard work, and it requires tremendous focus.''

Lloyd, whose last stage appearance was in ``Waiting for Godot'' two years ago in New York, was pleased to find a role that veered away from the wacked out individuals he played in ``The Addams Family'' and the ``Back to the Future'' movies.

Soft-spoken and decidedly low-key during an interview at the Chateau Marmont, the 52-year-old actor hopes roles like ``Unexpected Man's'' author come his way more often.

``Before I came out here, I did a lot of theater and a lot of it was serious stuff,'' said Lloyd. ``Then I came out here, and 'Taxi,' Reverend Jim, and 'Back to the Future' series and other things sort of established me in a different sort of way. So I guess I'm trying to get back to doing serious stuff. I have no regrets about it, but I'm trying to get a little balance.''

``THE UNEXPECTED MAN''

Where: Geffen Playhouse, 10886 Le Conte Ave., Westwood.

When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday, 4 and 8:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 and 7 p.m. Sunday; through Oct. 21.

Tickets: $30 to $46. Call [phone].Christopher Lloyd and Holland Taylor star in the Geffen Playhouse production of ``The Unexpected Man.''

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