by AMY BARRATT

In an average year of theatregoing, it's an experience I have only once, at most, twice. No matter what state I'm in going into the theatre - grumpy, sleepy, or any number of other dwarves - I get swept up by the play, carried along on a wave of excitement and return home in a state that I think must be close to what Aristotle was getting at when he coined the term "catharsis."

Last Thursday, the opening of Harry Standjofski's Here and There, was such a night. This world premiere is, to my knowledge, the Montreal playwright's most ambitious work. The action takes place in an unnamed country somewhere in Europe (the former Yugoslavia?) that's crumbling under civil war. It also takes place in an unspecified Canadian city, thus, here and there. There are 13 actors on stage, and they play a total of over 30 characters. The use of the word "epic" in the publicity material is not misplaced.

A production of Le Nouveau Théâtre Anglais, the company that Standjofski started two years ago with fellow playwright Thomas Morison, it's being performed in the D.B. Clarke Theatre in Concordia's Hall Building. Directing his own work, Standjofski has put together one of the best casts, English or French, that I've ever seen in this city. It includes some "old pros" with 20 years experience behind them, and others still at the beginning of what deserve to be illustrious careers; the cast is rounded out by several current Concordia students.

It's always tricky to try to say what a Harry Standjofski play is "about." This one certainly doesn't follow any conventional structure, and maybe that's the source of some of the excitement. You really can't guess what's going to happen, and yet you feel that the playwright knows, or if he doesn't, the characters do. Meanwhile, the characters and relationships are so compelling and the writing so witty and smart that you're happy just to be along for the ride.

Andreas Apergis plays Odon (Don to his Canadian friends), who travels to his mother's homeland as a war photographer. He's an incorrigible womanizer who wants to change in order to be worthy of the fiancée he abandoned and then lost track of in the war.

We don't meet him until several scenes in, however. The play begins with the character of Fyona, played by the electrifying Jeanne Bowser. In a handful of scenes, she burns this funny, sexy, smart and tragic character into our consciousness. Then she disappears, but she continues to haunt the play much as her memory haunts Odon.

The dream cast also includes Susan Glover, Cary Lawrence, Holly O'Brien, Bill Rowat and Felicia Schulman.

The set design, by Eric Mongerson, is kept simple and non-realistic. As there are almost as many settings as characters, this is a necessity. Eve-line Leduc's costumes do an excellent job of capturing, not to mention differentiating, the characters. The theatre has been made more intimate by limiting seating to the front section.

Here and There is the best comedy about war and sexual politics since Lysistrata. If this production doesn't get picked up by one of the established theatres in town, either English or French, well, there's no justice.

Here and There runs until Feb. 12 at the D.B. Clarke Theatre (1455 de Maisonneuve W.) $16-$20, 342-8320

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