Terence McNally's 'A Perfect Ganesh' Is Long And Tedious AtTimes, But Graced With Good Performances. By Margaret Regan THE HINDI GOD Ganesha is everywhere, according to playwright Terence McNally. He's in the moonlight and the dawn, in your belly and your bowels. He is wherever there is life and death. "I am your kiss, I am your cancer," Ganesha gleefully tells the audience in the opening scene of A Perfect Ganesh, Arizona Theatre Company's latest offering. And as far as this glittery apparition is concerned, it doesn't much matter whether it's the kiss or the cancer that you get. Both are part of the life journey and the sooner you realize it, the faster you'll find your bliss. This strange metaphysical play, loosely anchored by the story of two Connecticut matrons' journey to India, comes as a surprise to audiences who saw ATC's 1993 production of McNally's Lips Together, Teeth Apart. That play was a brittle battle of the sexes and the sexual orientations, set in a trendy Fire Island, New York, beach house. A Perfect Ganesh, for all its gods and ghosts and Passage to India enchantment, doesn't abandon the East Coast sensibility of McNally, ranked these days as one of the hottest New York playwrights. The two women bring it with them all the way to the subcontinent. Ably played by Betsy Palmer and Penelope Windust, Margaret and Katharine are conventional, almost stereotypical characters. Margaret freely admits she's a "rich bitch" who wants to see India at arm's length and in comfort, through the window of a hotel or train, first class, of course. Katharine wants the whole experience--she's given to reciting daily affirmations--and she torments herself that she cannot bring herself to live up to her youthful ambition of embracing a leper on the streets. And the pair of them bicker so much that at times the audience unhappily feels all the tedium of their long journey, especially when the two acts drag on to their overlong 75 minutes each. But there is that magical, mischievous Ganesha, who greets them at every turn, wherever they find themselves in India. Marvelously portrayed by the newcomer David Paul Francis, decked out in elephant head mask, shiny clothes and glitter dusted on his roly-poly belly, Ganesha is the tour guide and the hotel maid, the oarsman on the Ganges, the orphan in the streets. He's the spirit of India, as envisioned by McNally, and as the traditional "patron of learning and queller of obstacles" he's there to help the women on their journey toward healing. Because there's another motivation for this trip, of course, much deeper than the acquisition of Indian silks and the figurine of the perfect Ganesh: Katharine is mourning the murder of a gay son by New York thugs, Margaret is mourning a son lost so long ago she cannot even speak of him. McNally wants us to take his word for it that this is what India is all about. Sometimes he seems a bit like a dumbbell tourist himself, picking and choosing his Indian motifs from a colorful marketplace of native philosophies, and using that impoverished nation's relentless life and death as a metaphor for spiritual resignation. Still, he's grasping at something profound, if not always successfully, and he certainly hasn't lost his wicked sense of humor. His odd play, directed by Andrew J. Traister, is well served by all four actors, but John Walcutt's breathtaking performance alone is worth the price of admission. Walcutt energetically portrays more than a dozen men, from the ghost of Katharine's murdered son to a manic Air India agent to another gay man dying rather cheerfully of AIDS in Bombay with his lover. And Ralph Funicello's austere set is a magic trick worthy of Ganesha himself: It's a simple wall of monochrome sliding screens that somehow transforms itself in the imagination into a richly colored kaleidoscope of India. A Perfect Ganesh continues at various times through Saturday, April 13, at The Temple Of Music And Art, 330 S. Scott Ave. Ticket prices range from $17 to $26. Journey as Metaphor in a Perfect Ganesh, a free panel discussion with several UA professors, meets at 7 p.m. Monday, April 8, at the theatre. For more information or play reservations call 622-2823.

		© 1995-97 Tucson Weekly . Info Booth