The Brides, Harry Kondoleon's tone poem for the stage, will receive its first West Coast production in 15 years when the Sacred Fools company unveils its version of the play on March 30. The run is through April 29.

Kondoleon wrote 17 plays and twice won an Obie Award. The Brides was first produced in New York in 1980, a year before Kondoleon graduated from the Yale School of Drama. His life and career were tragically cut short by AIDS.

The Brides explores the experience of women in relation to female archetypes and dreams, aspirations and expectations in regards to weddings -- and what comes after. Themes touched in the free-form narrative are sex, betrayal, marriage, compromise and love.

Sacred Fools' approach to this short work is unusual, in that it is presenting the play three times in the same evening with three different directors and three different casts.

The impetus for mounting the production came from the women writer's unit within the company. Though The Brides was written by a man, the women felt that Kondoleon had uncanny insights into the female psyche.Donna Tina Charles is the producer. Her directors are Pogo Saito, Blake Williams and Gerald McClanahan.

Sacred Fools Theatre is located at 660 N. Heliotrope Drive. For tickets and information call (3l0) 281-8337 or visit www.SacredFools.org.

-- By Willard Manus
Southern California Correspondent