Evil Motives, Liberty Collide in ‘Denial’

In an episode of “Star Trek,” Captain Kirk had to defeat an entity that drew its strength from hate and conflict. In “Denial” at the Actors Alley, Bernard Cooper (Terry J. Evans, alternating with Joe J. Garcia) is such an evil being--a small, unassuming, almost pleasant professor of timber-stress analysis, whose twisted thirst for notoriety feeds his ego and expands his power.

Evans slowly reveals this rotten side and his desire to destroy in the Peter Sagal drama. Abigail Gersten (Madonna Magee, alternating with Mimi Cozzens) is a tough Jewish attorney who accepts a case she believes will be “quick, clean and quiet,” defending a “little man with unpleasant ideas.” But her client, Cooper, has visions of talk shows and national magazine articles in his crusade to discredit the Holocaust. The 1st Amendment, the self-righteousness of the ACLU and the damaging effect of lies collide as the characters are forced to choose between doing what’s easy or what is right.

Sagal attempts to show that even great causes can be manipulated, but some of his plot devices--the young blustering assistant to the U.S. attorney (Danny Grossman, alternating with Alan Altshuld) and his unseen secret witness--are contrived. Using the secretary Stephanie (Wendy Collins) as a counterpoint to Gersten is also questionable, and Collins’ wooden acting is painful to watch beside Magee’s fiercely competent attorney in anguish with her career and her conscience. As the revered spokesman Noah Gomrowitz, Martin Schnitzer is gracefully tragic, shrinking from dignity to disgrace.

But it is Evans as the insidiously evil Cooper who carries this show, with the malignant glow of his scheming eyes and his gruesomely gleeful smiles.

* “Denial,” Actors Alley, El Portal Theatre, 5269 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 2 and 7 p.m. Ends July 13. $16. (818) 508-4200. Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes.