City Theatre In City Theatre's "Talking Heads," Miss Fozzard is played by Broadway vet Patricia Kilgarriff. Click photo for larger image. 'Talking Heads' Where: City Theatre, South Side. When: Through May 14, Tues. 7 p.m., Wed.-Fri. 8 p.m., Sat. 5:30 and 9 p.m., Sun. 2 p.m. Programs A and B presented in repertory in alternating performances. Tickets: $15-$40; 412-431-CITY.

Alan Bennett is a seductive master of observation and self-revealing detail. These are skills apparent in his large works, but they are the absolute heart of his seemingly modest monologues in "Talking Heads." City Theatre is now staging six of these, selected from the 13 Bennett has published, grouped in two programs and delivered by deliciously varied English women portrayed by Patricia Kilgarriff and Helena Ruoti.

Bennett's details create a layered tapestry of lacy complexity. First, there is the observational power of the ladies themselves. They see things we might not -- we men, certainly -- and they string them together with an apparent illogic that gradually reveals their shrewdness.

Or not. Because ultimately they cannot see (although there are exceptions) what is most interesting in Bennett's finely crafted mini-worlds -- themselves. So the details of their autobiographical nattering become the pattern in a separately woven tapestry that reveals their comic self-delusion, brush with tragedy or occasional triumph.

And while they reveal more than they realize, they can also refuse to say all that they know, leaving a residue of mystery, a fertile tension into which we are drawn. We are seduced into being just such nosy observers as they, sharing their conceit of discovery. But we cannot know them completely.

And what of us? Some of Bennett's ladies remain oblivious, some become all too aware and others may manage a small escape. But in seeing their comic foibles or melancholy epiphanies, we must reflect also on our own unacknowledged eddies or gulfs. "Talking Heads" is a mirror, a high comedy that sensitizes us to the painfully comic.

Taking both programs as a whole, you see the six monologues present a rich array of nuanced acting. Kilgarriff is a Broadway veteran who has a great gift for pursuing clues with self-satisfied glee while never noticing the banana peel beneath her own foot. Her performance is a master class in comedy. Ruoti's skills are more rueful -- she is best showing dawning apprehension, enveloping her like mist.

The high level of performance argues attentive directing by Tracy Brigden, all enhanced by the intimacy of the Hamburg Studio Theater.

Most people are probably going to one program or the other. On balance, I prefer Program B, but the funniest monologue is in Program A, so I'm not going to help you make up your mind which to see.

Program A

In "The Hand of God," Kilgarriff gives us antique dealer Celia, the quintessential Bennettian self-deluder, so vain of her small victories that she never sees the giant defeat looming. It's priceless. "A Lady of Letters" starts out equally self-delusive but then takes Kilgarriff's Irene on a surprising turn, proving that salvation and destruction are equally likely to be found just where you'd never expect.

Ruoti's centerpiece is "Her Big Chance," in which an aspiring actress is revealed as a bit player and more than a bit of a floozy. When ignorance is a kind of bliss, it really might be folly to be wise ... as the sunnily obtuse Lesley may actually know.

Program B

Ruoti's Rosemary in "Nights in the Gardens of Spain" (a sadly ironic title) is a repressed wife who finds a transforming friendship in an unexpected quarter, though it's not quite transforming enough. That serves equally as a brief summary of her Susan in "Bed Among the Lentils." Both pieces activate that telling haunt behind Ruoti's eyes.

My favorite piece is "Miss Fozzard Finds Her Feet," which allows Kilgarriff to be made a fool and to triumph anyway. This is Bennett's insight, that folly and wisdom are that close. He speaks ironically of "the valuable lesson that life is generally something that happens elsewhere," but of course it happens all around us, all the time.