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Thursday, June 05, 2003

By Anna Rosenstein

Ryan Dunn wants you to "come up and see her sometime." Somehow, when this pretty, bright redhead tosses her shoulders and purrs a line like that, she's all buxom, Brooklyn blonde. She's all Mae West.

	Ryan Dunn plays both Mae West and Jo, a die-hard Mae West fan, in "Dirty Blonde" at the O'Reilly Theater. (John Heller, Post-Gazette) "Dirty Blonde" Where: Pittsburgh Public Theater at the O'Reilly Theater, Downtown. When: 8 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays (some exceptions). Performances run through July 6. Tickets: $12 to $46; 412-316-1600.

"She seeps into the way I talk," laughs Dunn, adding that her husband, director Lou Jacob, has to keep telling her, "You're doing Mae again!" Which isn't necessarily bad for a relationship. Even if you've never seen one of her films, just about everyone knows Mae West was smart and funny and oozed a raw sexuality that made the censors hyperventilate.

That's really all Dunn knew about West when she was cast as Jo/Mae in Claudia Shear's "Dirty Blonde," a role originated by Shear in her Tony Award-nominated play. The Public Theater production is Dunn's second time in the role, but she remembers her reaction to West when she began her research.

"I was really stunned and impressed when I first watched the films," says Dunn. "I thought what she was doing was so weird. She unsettled me. I thought, 'She's actually not that pretty, and she's acting like she's the greatest thing in the world.' "

Dunn continues to marvel that, while West couldn't "hold a candle to other glamour girls of the day," she acted like she was the "bee's knees," a quaint turn of phrase that sounds slightly ironic against the sultry rumble that Dunn slips in for effect.

Capturing West's self-deprecating sexuality on stage has been somewhat difficult. "She was a creature of film," Dunn explains, "and her delivery was very subtle, a growl or a purr. You can't be that subtle on stage."

Even more challenging was playing West in her earlier Vaudeville years. "From what I hear, she was pure energy," Dunn says slyly, hinting at a fireball who hadn't yet learned to harness her own power. Dunn thinks there were clues even then to what West would become as she worked at honing her act. "I want the audience to see that seed," she says, even before they see the West they expect and know.

When it comes to that West, Dunn talks about comedy, sexuality and a Brooklyn girl with no manners or, as West would say, "the kind of girl who lost her reputation and never missed it."

While it's easy to focus on the dynamic Mae West when talking about "Dirty Blonde," she's only part of the story. At the heart of the play is Dunn's other character, Jo, a die-hard Mae West fan. While visiting her idol's grave, Jo meets Charlie (Lucas Caleb Rooney) and they embark on a rather bumpy path to love.

Dunn recalls that her first incarnation of Jo was vulnerable and shared few qualities with Mae. Now, director Ted Pappas has asked her to unearth a toughness in Jo. "To me, this means she's even more vulnerable inside." But in making the two characters more similar, the challenge becomes keeping them distinct.

But Dunn likes the close juxtaposition. She thinks it helps to explore why Jo and Charlie need Mae to get to each other. We see the shells and the cracks in the shells. "That," says Dunn, "is an incredible life lesson about risk."

Anna Rosenstein is a freelance theater critic.