NO 'HEROES' WORSHIP.

Byline: Evan Henerson

Theater Critic

At Lincoln Center, they're feasting on eight hours of 19th-century Russian intellectuals.

In Westwood, we get 100 minutes of geezer piffle.

The common denominator between the theatrical epic "The Coast of Utopia" back East and the American premiere of "Heroes" at the Geffen Playhouse is celebrated playwright Tom Stoppard, whose name usually assures some kind of intellectual workout.

Stoppard (the author of "Arcadia" and "The Real Thing") is actually responsible only for the translation of Gerald Sibleyras' play "Le Vent des Peupliers," remaming it "Heroes." But because the man is a hot commodity, and because the play took in audiences in London, the Geffen marketeers figured, why not ballyhoo the translator?

Because this is thin stuff, that's why, even with the steady attempts by performers Richard Benjamin, Len Cariou and George Segal to jack some air into this leaky tire of a comedy. The men amuse, certainly. The play, not so much.

In 1959, three World War I veterans pass the time on a terrace of a military retirement home, waiting for nothing in particular, plotting an unlikely escape and occasionally leering at whatever rare bit of female flesh passes their field of vision. Usually it's a nun.

Henri (played by Cariou), who has been at the home the longest, has a bad leg. Philippe (Benjamin) has a bit of shrapnel in his head, leaving him prone to fainting spells. Gustave, the newcomer (Segal), talks a better game than he plays and rarely leaves his room, except for these terrace meets.

A stone statue of a dog, staring ironically out from Robert Jones' sloping and overly lush set, completes the quartet.

You could say that the three gents look out for each other, and they'll need each other -- and the dog statue -- to complete their "mission." Director Thea Sharrock, who also helmed the London production, allows not an eyedropperful of sentimentality to her delusional trio. Well, OK. Maybe one. As the curtain falls.

Stoppard, I repeat, didn't write "Heroes," but given the tone of his own plays, you can see why he took to it.

Segal, playing the calmest blowhard ever seen, delivers his lines with caustic smugness from behind a large mustache. Benjamin's lankiness lends itself well to the play's physical humor. (At one point, he walks on stage after having passed out into an open grave.) Cariou, as the only one capable of breaching the home's grounds, bubbles to life after discovering a nearby girls' school. He's convincing -- but not bubble-bursting -- as the play's sanest voice.

The three actors are a kick to watch, and their comfort as a trio -- some opening-night line fluffs notwithstanding -- should serve the play well.

That their efforts are in the service of inferior work is the pity. Intelligent translation or not, "Heroes" is a play where we're hoping against hope that that dog statue will move and finally make things interesting.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

[e-mail]

HEROES - Two and one half stars

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, 2 and 7 p.m. Sunday; through May 27.

Tickets: $35 to $69. [phone].

In a nutshell: On the porch with dotty soldiers.

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Photo:

Len Cariou, left, George Segal and Richard Benjamin are old soldiers trying to escape from a veterans' home in "Heroes."