AN ACTOR ROLLING WITH THE PUNCHES

In real life, Mark Lindsay Chapman is an expectant daddy. At the same time, on stage--in David Rudkin’s “Ashes” (at the Zephyr through Aug. 9)--Chapman is batting a big zero in the fertility department.

“For me, (conceiving) was as easy as being hit by a bus,” the actor said cheerfully. For the couple in the play, however, it’s a much grimmer proposition. Endless tests, lovemaking-by-the-clock, failed adoption, miscarriage--all of it taking place in the shadow of today’s Northern Ireland.

“Things don’t work out for these people,” Chapman, 33, concluded. “It’s just life. Some people can roll with the punches, stay sane and normal. I don’t think I’m sane and normal.”

The British-born, American-educated actor gives far more credit to the sanity and strength of women: “They go through more in life. They feel more, they take more.”

When, recently, his four-months-pregnant wife began spotting, he admits he didn’t take it well. “She was saying, ‘It’s OK, I’m fine,’ and I was screaming, ‘It’s fate! First John Lennon and now this!’ ”

Chapman gained notoriety when he was bumped from Lennon’s 1985 TV-movie bio because of the similarity of his name with Lennon’s assassin, Mark David Chapman. (At the time, the actor was using his middle name, Mark Lindsay, since there was another Mark Chapman in Actor’s Equity. Although film executives knew of the situation at the beginning, Yoko Ono later stepped in and vetoed the casting as “bad karma.”)

“It was a bad break,” Chapman said with a shrug. “But it got me William Morris, an agent who’s stood by me.” But, no, it did not get him a role in an NBC-TV movie.

“That was such bull,” he snorted. “They put that in the paper, that they’d given me a movie (“Annihilator”) as a consolation prize. I auditioned for that when I first came over here. Everything I’ve gotten, I’ve had to fight for--like every other actor. Do you really think a corporation like NBC gives away parts in major movies just because they feel sorry for you?

“I’m not bitter,” he said resignedly. “Though, sure, the Lennon thing does get to be a bit tiring. I did eight years of theater in England, and everything I’ve done here has gotten great reviews”--including a 1986 L.A. Weekly Award for “Shrew” at Ensemble Studio Theatre. He’s also high on his current role, though he acknowledged it takes its toll--physically and psychically. On audiences, too: “People don’t seem to want to see something that’s going to give them a bit of a shake, make them think.”

Having acted in Ireland, Chapman feels close to that pain as well.

“It’s the indirectness, the nastiness--bombs falling on people who have nothing to do with (the war): children, old people, people on their way to work. You don’t see it on the news. If the news was real, they’d say, ‘Look what’s happening in the world. This is a little girl; she’s just lost her parents, has nowhere to go. This is an earthquake: 300 people just died. This is a plane crash: Here are the people who’ve died.’

“Fundamental things are happening in this world and people don’t want to see. They don’t want to care about people who can’t have babies, or old people, people who can’t take care of themselves or have limbs missing. Bob Geldof has to beg to get a bunch of pop stars to do Live Aid so people will give money for those dying in Africa.”

Clearly, Chapman is a man who takes things seriously. “There’s a lot of good in this life,” he nodded, “but a lot of bad, too. I’m not saying I’m affected by the world’s troubles 24 hours a day. But when I’m doing a play like this, it rubs off and I take it home. My wife, Kathy, is a real angel--and I’m self-destructive and depressive. I don’t mean to be, but I can be such a bad guy sometimes.”

Steady work would help. He’d love a Western (so what if they’re not in vogue; Chapman contends that he can play American as well as the next guy). Right now, however, he’s laying bricks by day and acting by night. “So I’m feeling a bit tired, a bit sorry for myself.” An added insult: His insurance won’t pay for psychiatric visits.

“Who more than an actor needs to see a psychiatrist--except, perhaps a politician? And some of them are actors. . . . I mean, it’s a happy life. But I’m still a bit of a loony. The trouble is, I can’t do anything else. I wasn’t good at other jobs. All I was good at was coming on stage and playing Mercutio or Hamlet or Richard II.” He smiled wickedly. “Or a loony.”