by COOPER ROBB

There are a few plays that you just don’t leave to chance. For instance, no right-minded theater company holds auditions for the role of Hamlet. If you don’t already know that you have an actor lined-up capable of playing the melancholy Dane, you simply don’t produce the play.

Another such play is James Goldman’s The Lion in Winter. If Peter O’Toole and Katherine Hepburn (who starred so brilliantly in the film version) aren’t able to reprise their roles as King Henry II and his estranged wife Eleanor, put the script back on the shelf and forget about it. It won’t work. Or at least so goes the popular reasoning.

But then The Stagecrafters theater is a particular ambitious community theater, and apparently director Sally Minter knows no fear. Still, when I heard that Stagecrafters was mounting a revival of The Lion in Winter, I must admit my expectations were not high. For while the company has a stable of fine actors, I had yet to see anyone capable of portraying the full breadth of these two difficult and complex characters, and when I settled in my seat for the Sunday matinee, it was with more than a little trepidation.

However, I am happy to report that although Stagecrafters newcomers David Swartz and April Woodall’s Henry and Eleanor are far from perfect, their performances are more than good enough to make Minter’s sure-handed revival surprisingly successful.

One of the finest plotted scripts in theater history, Winter is full of twists and turns, intrigues and retaliations. The story is far too complex to recount here, but suffice to let you know that Henry and Eleanor cannot agree which of their three sons: Richard, John or Jeffrey, should inhabit the throne when Henry dies.

Actually that is just one of many things the two can’t agree on. In fact, the only subject in which they are in agreement is that they have done a really wretched job of raising their sons.

Similar to King Lear or Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Henry’s familial empire is a web of mendacity. Everyone will lie to get ahead, and they are constantly and quite literally at each other’s throats. However, for all their murderous plots and deceits, Henry and Eleanor’s love for each other is constant, and both Swartz and Woodall are good at conveying that beneath all the bickering, the two realize they are inseparable.

Supported by well-tuned performances from Aaron Oster as the sniveling John, Mark Grayson as the courageous but conflicted Richard, Peter Miltz as the soulless Jeffrey, Tina Moroni as Henry’s mistress Alais and Gil Johnson as the young French king, Phillip, Swartz and Woodall carry the production with their wit and general sense of aplomb. Both struggle in the scenes that call for deeper displays of emotion, but while Henry and Eleanor are bombastic, they are rarely emotional, and the flaw does not hinder the production to a great degree.

Though we may be entertained by Henry and Eleanor’s clever banter and creatively cruel jibes, there are larger themes of work in Goldman’s carefully constructed drama including a fascinating exploration of normality and the almost non-existent line between love and hate. Ultimately, Henry and Eleanor realize that all the chaos in their lives is the consequence of their own shortcomings, and the play smartly ends with the two on their knees in the castle dungeon. They are still together and always shall be, locked away in a prison of their own making.

Through November 22, $15, The Stagecrafters, 8130-34 Germantown Ave., 215-247-8881.