GOLDEN THEATER SET IN A GOLDEN AGE

"Moonlight and Magnolias" now at Invisible Theatre is the perfect play-going experience, full of emotional conflict, comedy and truth. Betsy Kruse Craig adds to the fun as director by keeping the pace at neck-snapping speed, zipping punch lines back and forth across the stage until it feels like you're watching one of those Chinese world championship ping-pong matches.

Perhaps more significantly, this production kicks off Invisible Theatre's 40^th anniversary season in fine style, symbolizing quite literally what a life on the stage is supposed to be all about. 

For Dwayne Palmer, "Moonlight and Magnolias" is his finest performance yet. Looking at times like he is about to explode, Palmer plays the raving egomaniac Hollywood mogul David O. Selznick. At other times he is exactly the kind of charming schmoozer you just know could get other powerful whacked out ego freaks to do exactly what he wanted.

Giving away nothing in energy or alacrity, veteran actors Roberto Guajardo as garrulous writer Ben Hecht and Terry Erbe as arrogant director Victor Fleming are happy to push their own roles to equally emotional extremes.

Getting laughs with her rigid propriety is Victoria McGee playing Selznick's obedient secretary.

On the surface, this play by Ron Hutchinson is about the sword -wielding week in 1939 when these three Hollywood high flyers holed up in Selznick's office to re-visualize and re-write the script that made "Gone With the Wind" the big-screen classic it is today. 

As metaphor, "Moonlight and Magnolias" slices with a gleaming scalpel straight into the conniving heart of Hollywood in the 1930s. It was a time when the men with a good ear for a great story – and the bravado to sell dreams to millionaires – could wield the power of emperors. At least in their own cinema kingdoms. 

There were only a few men at the time that had such an ear. David O. Selznick was one, although we are told he also had some significant insecurities.  But certainly he had an uncanny intuition for looking at a sketch on a damp cocktail napkin and seeing a major motion picture.

Selznick also knew which insignificant details were extremely important, such as having only crushed ice in the mint juleps. There were no refrigerators making ice cubes during the Civil War.

It's all about the vision. Fleming tells a marvelous story about how movie directors must be unyielding in their dedication to a particular vision. Every day the director is working on a picture, someone will put their arm around the director and ask for one small insignificant change in the script.

Wanting to keep the project going, the director could agree to the tiny change. But after several months, these add up to a couple of hundred script changes and the director's original vision is lost forever.

 Anyone who loves classic movies will love "Moonlight and Magnolias." Hutchinson uses his three characters as windows into three quite different views of what makes Hollywood run – the writer, the director and the producer.

The writer and the director's contributions, we can appreciate. But what artistic input, exactly, does the producer provide? After watching Palmer's amazing performance, you will know the answer.

Performances continue at the Invisible Theatre, 1400 N. First Ave., on Wednesdays and Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 3 p.m., until Oct. 3. All tickets are $25. For details and  reservations, 882-9721, or visit www.invisibletheatre.com