The verbal wars have broken out again at the Ahmanson Theatre, as the cast of the New York revival of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? takes the stage through March 18. Anthony Page directs.

In a small New England college town, George (Bill Irwin) and Martha (Kathleen Turner) return from a faculty party. It’s 2:00 a.m. and Martha, daughter of the college president, has invited a new faculty couple over for drinks, much to the disgust of her history professor husband.

George and Martha, massively unhappy yet deeply attached, inhabit a netherworld of realism and illusion in which it is sometimes difficult to distinguish one from the other. They survive by a combination of verbal sparring in the here and now, and the construction of a preferable reality maintained by mutual agreement. Both are watered by copious amounts of alcohol.

There is, for example, the matter of their imaginary son, about whom wonderful fictions have been invented and whose existence is revealed to the guests by Martha.

The faculty newcomers, biology professor Nick (David Furr) and his vapid and innocent wife Honey (Kathleen Early) arrive, little expecting the hornet’s nest they have stepped into. When the games Martha and George play (such as Hump the Hostess and Get the Guests) get too rough, Nick and Honey flee, leaving George and Martha to their comfortable mutual sniping.

This Virginia Woolf looks as good as it plays, in a living room perfectly designed by John Lee Beatty, complete with books everywhere, a standard-issue couch, a staircase and plenty of booze on the sideboard.

Turner and Irwin are terrific in their demanding roles most-associated with the film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Turner, who has put on some weight since her sultry Body Heat days, looks and sounds exactly right with her throaty voice and bulldozer demeanor. Justly nominated for a Tony, she lost out to Cherry Jones in Doubt.

Irwin, who won the Best Actor Tony with this outstanding performance, comes from the clown world – an original member of San Francisco’s Pickle Family Circus – and is probably best known for comedy. This background serves him well here, where timing and body language are of paramount importance.

Early and Furr are also excellent as the brandy-addicted mouse and the ambitious but nonplussed new faculty hire who become the latest victims of the George and Martha show.

I have not seen this play onstage in some years. The emotional devastation I was left with made me forget how funny (though caustic) many of the lines are. I must admit to some bewilderment that the opening night audience at the Ahmanson sounded like a sitcom laugh track, even to the point of drowning out lines.

The Georges and Marthas of the world will always be with us, perhaps never so unsettlingly drawn as in Albee’s play or so well portrayed as by this cast.

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? plays through March 18 at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles. Shows Tuesday through Thursday at 7:30 p.m.; Friday and Saturday at 8:00 p.m.; matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 p.m. For tickets, call (213) 628-2772 or visit www.centertheatregroup.org.

Life and death, rebirth and growth are themes in the musical version of the children’s classic The Secret Garden, onstage through March 11 at Lamb’s Players Theatre.

Winner of three of the six Tonys for which it was nominated in 1991, The Secret Garden features music by Lucy Simon, whose score for Zhivago was recently heard at La Jolla Playhouse. This performance is directed by Robert Smith.

Mary Lennox (Allie Trimm) is orphaned in India at the age of 10 when her parents succumb to cholera. The child is sent to England to live with her uncle Archibald Craven (David S. Humphrey), a hunchback with a tragedy of his own: the loss of his dear wife Lily (Deborah Gilmour Smyth) in childbirth. Their bedridden son Colin (Austyn Myers), now 10, is isolated in his room and off-limits as a playmate for Mary.

A child of privilege, Mary arrives self-centered and sharp-tongued and proceeds to make herself utterly unlovable with her obnoxious behavior. In need of a parent’s influence but left to her own devices, she meets gardener Ben Weatherstaff (Doren Elias), who wins her over with comments like, “We’re neither of us good-lookin’” and “We’re as sour as we look.” Ben begins to teach her about nature and regeneration.

Then she meets the sprightly Pan-like Dickon (Jon Lorenz), who tells of a forgotten garden on the property that no one is allowed to enter, and introduces her to a robin that also knows about the garden. Unlocking the garden opens Mary’s eyes to the notions of growth, rebirth and change.

But even with all the life around her, death is never far away: Mary’s lost parents and friends keep reappearing, Greek chorus style, along with Archie’s wife, Lily.

Mary manages to become a caring young lady almost despite poor old Archie, whose limited fathering skills she severely tests. Archie speaks for all who parent by pocketbook when he sings plaintively, “Why can’t she ask for a treasure, something money can buy? When I offer her the world, she asks for ‘a bit of earth.’”

Vocally, this is one of the best casts Lamb’s has put together. Gilmour Smyth is most impressive (and gets the flashiest notes), but Humphrey and Randall Dodge (as Craven’s brother Neville) also give fine performances. Season Duffy, as chambermaid Martha, belts out a song as well as any other in this cast. Simon’s music is pleasant and listenable, but by the second act the songs begin to sound alike.

The Lamb’s production boasts extremely clever and innovative stagecraft: a versatile set by Mike Buckley, terrific lighting by Nathan Peirson and Jeanne Reith’s perfect costumes. In addition, an excellent five-piece band led by G. Scott Lacy and Smyth’s fine direction complement the dramatic action.

The Secret Garden plays through March 3 at Lamb’s Players Theatre. Shows Tuesday through Thursday at 7:30 p.m.; Friday and Saturday at 8:00 p.m.; matinees Saturday at 4:00 p.m. and Sunday at 2:00 p.m. For tickets, call (619) 437-0600 or visit www.lambsplayers.org.