Take a large country in self-denial and an identity crisis. Focus on a feckless individual with his own identity crisis, battered by the tides of time and place and divided within himself. Spread over 60-plus years and structure with surreal theatricality.

		"I.D." Where: Quantum Theatre at The Pipe Building, 3000 Liberty Ave., Strip District. When: Through June 5; Thurs.-Sat. 8 p.m.; Sun. 2 p.m. Tickets: $22; $15 student; 412-394-3353.

Then give the result to Quantum Theatre, which performs it in yet another dramatic, expansive industrial space -- with a working crane, no less -- and showcases some fine Pittsburgh actors in ways you've never seen.

The result is the American debut of Sir Antony Sher's "I.D.," a play most obviously "about" the 1966 assassination of Hendrik Verwoerd, the South African prime minister who was notorious as the architect of apartheid. But "I.D." is more interestingly about the characters of Verwoerd and, especially, of the assassin, Demetrios Tsafendas, who comes complete with a split personality brilliantly embodied -- get this! -- in the person of the tapeworm which may have been sharing his existence. It's a more metaphor-rich narrative conceit than the figure of Che in "Evita," whom it somewhat resembles.

And "I.D." is also about the split personality of South Africa itself, with one side sketched in by a series of fumbling or malign bureaucrats, from doctors to paper pushers to prison guards, and the other by a small group of glancingly seen anti-government activists.

Given this sprawl of subject matter and points of interest, though, I suspect "I.D." has an identity crisis of its own. What is its central story or conflict? I can't be sure -- and this feels like a failure of the expansive imagination that also makes the play so interesting.

That imagination, of course, belongs to Sher, a South African long established as one of the most electric actors in England. Premiered at London's noted Almeida Theatre in 2003, this is his first play, which may explain its diffuse structure.

Its overriding issue is apartheid, of course, an exercise in totalitarian identity management that keeps springing leaks. This massive political insanity is paralleled or parodied in the personal identity crises the play tracks, none more vividly than that of the psychotically split Tsafendas.

Apparently born to a Cretan father and colored (i.e. mulatto) mother, he has wandered the world trying to find a home, a cause, love, whatever. Persona non grata just about everywhere, he manages to slip into South Africa and tries to get his I.D. changed from white to colored so he can pursue his courtship of a bewildered black woman. The anger generated by apartheid builds in him and/or in the persona of his tapeworm alter ego, and the assassination results.

Meanwhile, we've been tracking the smugly impervious Verwoerd, himself an alien in South Africa, through a previous assassination attempt. The doctors and officials dealing with both Verwoerd and Tsafendas are a source of satiric comedy, and the tapeworm narrates with demonic glee.

To disavow the issues raised by the assassination, the state inevitably declared Tsafendas insane and imprisoned him for 28 years under medieval conditions.

Ironically, he outlived apartheid and spent his final four years in a proper hospital, still seeking identity and love.

Director Karla Boos uses the huge expanse of the Pipe Building and designer Stephanie Mayer's Escher-like staircases and platforms to allow long arrivals and scenes tucked here and there. The setting sun through high western windows throws a beautiful backlight, increasing the depth and texture of the overall space, at some cost to closer contact with what's happening up front -- a parallel to the split focus of Sher's script, come to think.

But the major action focuses on a small plat of green sod in the actual shape of Africa, right in front. It isn't just recalcitrant Afkrikaaners we're talking about, but a whole continent seeking identity.

John Shepard plays Tsafendas (the role Sher gave himself) with a cheery lopsidedness just a few inches (check the mad eyes) from mania. It's a rich, varied portrayal of an enigma. The mania is acted out mainly by Mark Staley as the snakeskin-clad, tribal-tattooed, demented tapeworm -- an extraordinarily physical and insinuating performance. At the other extreme is Rick Kemp's serenely smug Verwoerd, an equally impressive performance, a black hole of emotions repressed by iron will.

Strongest in support is Wabei Siyolwe as Tsafendas' sympathetic Helen (his Penelope, according to his Ulysses metaphor). What a wonderful actor. It is the peripheral nature of Helen's story and of all black South Africa that costs the play some of its urgency.

Among the many roles most of the other actors play, Doug Mertz is vivid as a tapeworm expert, Doug Pona as an asylum attendant, Patrick Jordan as Verwoerd's brutal successor, Rebecca Covey as Verwoerd's conflicted wife, Bryant Dillon as a perky legislative aide and Aaron Alpern as the psychiatrist who has to act rather transparently as the author's mouthpiece.

There's a lot going on in these two hours and forty minutes, and yet the great event -- the end of apartheid -- happens off at the edge. That's where I felt the play's emotional center, not with the hapless Tsafendas. But structural diffusion aside, "I.D." boasts charismatic acting and a presentation of fluidity and interest.