Jodie's Body, the one-woman Off-Broadway show currently playing at the Gene Frankel Theatre, will mark its 250th performances on Oct. 26, making it the longest running solo piece of 1998. Body has been running since Jan. 5, though it did not officially open until May 4. It stars Aviva Jane Carlin; Kenneth Elliot is the director.

The Uganda-born, Kenya-raised Carlin stars as Jodie, an overweight artist's model posing nude for a London art class three days after the first elections in South Africa. Part of that country's white upper class, Jodie muses about political issues. According to a statement, she realizes that "if the mighty structure which upheld apartheid could be dismantled, why should we not also take apart the one which governs our image of our physical selves?" Says spokesperson Alice Herrick, the play asks, "Who decides what is the perfect body? Why can't we get away from these whole fashion-magazine notions?"

Carlin's look at geographical and gender politics first played at Seattle, WA's Brown Bag Theatre in 1995 and later opened the Watermark Theatre's Word Fire Festival in NYC. This mounting is produced by the New Mercury Players.

For tickets ($18) and information on Jodie's Body in an open run at the Gene Frankel Theatre, 24 Bond St., call (212) 269-4200.

-- By Robert Simonson and David Lefkowitz