CHANNELING CHANDLER IN HARD-BOILED 'DAHLIA'.

Byline: Evan Henerson Theater Critic

THE STREET SIGNS outside the theater may all say Venice, but everything going on inside the Pacific Resident Theatre is a slice of pure L.A. lore.

The seamy and hopeless streets of Raymond Chandler's L.A. are lovingly evoked in ``The Blue Dahlia,'' a stage adaptation of Chandler's novel (also a 1946 film) written by Dan O'Connor. The atmosphere is dead on, and O'Connor, who also directs, has peppered his Pacific Resident Theatre Ensemble production with guns and hoods, nasty secrets, molls and torch singers. Compact and never campy, this ``Dahlia'' is a gem.

Chandler created Philip Marlowe, but ``The Blue Dahlia'' is actually a murder mystery without a legitimate gumshoe. A square-jawed U.S. Navy pilot named Johnny Morrison (and played by Robb Derriner) returns from overseas and reunites with his boozy, faithless wife, who is murdered mere moments after he leaves. His best alibi is the mysterious blonde (Katy Selverstone) who gives him a rain-soaked ride to Malibu. And if our man Johnny didn't pull the trigger, there is no shortage of people in Helen Morrison's (Martha Hackett) flighty orbit who might have bumped her off.

To a person, the performers have the genre's style and mannerisms down cold. The red-haired cigarette girl (Kristin Iazetta) possesses a knowing look while the desk clerk (Sara Newman) spends her downtime opining on the phone about the merits of Betty Grable's gams. As Harwood, the owner of the infamous Blue Dahlia nightclub, Matt McKenzie is all slick and shadiness, while the Dahlia's torch singer, played by Maura M. Knowles, croons from her perch on the stage's second level. Costume designer Audrey Eisner has smoothly clothed and coiffed the players to honor another age, but the ensemble is clearly following adapter/director O'Connor's shining example.

A tip of the fedora also to Alexander Ensberg and the entire ``Blue Dahlia'' design team. It's no mean feat to put a realistic facsimile of the entire City of Angels in a tiny Venice storefront. But the neon, Hollywood sign, palm trees, shifting locales and even an automobile are all present and accounted for.

Whodunit? Doesn't much matter. The pleasure is entirely in the journey.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

THE BLUE DAHLIA - Three and one half stars

Where: Pacific Resident Theatre, 703 Venice Blvd., Venice.

When: 8 tonight and Saturday, 3 p.m. Sunday. Continues weekends through Feb. 12.

Tickets: $20 to $27. Call [phone].

In a nutshell: The streets of Raymond Chandler's L.A. are alive and mean as ever in Dan O'Connor's crackerjack adaptation.