An Actor Over the Edge in ’16 Routines’

“You make an impression through the impersonation of your self,” muses the near-catatonic former vaudevillian comic Martin Greenspan in a rare outburst of lucidity. “It’s not real.”

The absence of that elusive authenticity is a central concern in “16 Routines,” Murray Mednick’s intellectually challenging new comedy from the resurrected Padua Playwrights Productions at 2100 Square Feet.

Borscht Belt shtick edgily collides with highbrow metaphysics as Martin (a supremely hangdog William Mesnik) grapples with self-awareness amid the sanitarium for distressed actors to which he’s been confined after suffering a total memory lapse on stage.

As a parade of his show-biz colleagues (Maria O’Brien, Ryan Cutrona, Grace Zabriskie) join his lackadaisical, would-be caregivers (Rene Assa, Peggy Blow) in trying to pull him back into their world, Martin teeters on the brink of Pirandello-esque recognition of his true reality.

Scrupulously rendered in what one character dubs an “animated lack of affect,” Wesley Walker’s abstract staging offers nary a glimmer of an emotional life, and the cyclical, often repetitive hashing through the play’s obsessions can be tough going. Mednick wields language with a density reminiscent of James Joyce, making words and themes characters in their own right.

Lightening the load are the play’s affectionate homages to the bygone era of classic Jewish comedians, particularly O’Brien’s flawless portrait of Martin’s brassy stage partner--Ethel Merman in a more tentative, existential key.

* “16 Routines,” 2100 Square Feet, 5615 San Vicente Blvd., L.A. Thursdays through Sundays, 8 p.m. Ends May 5. $15. (323) 692-2652. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes.