THEATER : COMMENTARY : We’ll Have a Gay Old Time : A new crop of comedies is reveling in the joie de vivre of homosexuality, but the reality of conflicts and disease often gets lost in the fun.

In Chuck Ranberg’s comedy “End of the World Party,” Roger, a single gay man, says, “Why is it so hard for us? How come all my straight friends managed to get married?” His best friend replies with a casual shrug, “Because they’re straight. Their expectations are lower.”

It’s a simple laugh line whose implications are never explored. But it’s a crowd pleaser and typical of the new, frothy gay comedies now playing in Los Angeles.

Their considerable success drastically alters the landscape of gay theater. A new crop of comic writers has tapped into the gay audience’s desire for a break from the AIDS-themed plays of the last 10 years, and the fact that they want their relief in the form of laughter and romantic fantasy.

In addition to “End of the World Party,” enjoying an extended run through January at the Celebration Theatre, the play that best exemplifies the formula of mostly naive fun is “Party.” Written by David Dillon, this campy visit with friends playing a game of Facts and Fantasies is in its third month at the Henry Fonda Theatre. (In New York, it’s running strong after 10 months off-Broadway; spinoffs “Girl’s Party,” coauthored with Virginia Smiley, and “Third Party” have already had Chicago runs.) Two smaller plays have also enjoyed successful runs here: “Love Lies,” Jordan Budde’s more serious examination of gay love in the ‘90s (which closed recently), and Ronnie Larsen’s spoof “Making Porn” (which closes tonight, but reopens here in late March).

All these productions come in the wake of the 1994 Pulitzer Prize-winning “Love! Valour! Compassion!” Written by Terrence McNally, this comedy covers three weekends spent at a summer house by a group of gay New Yorkers. (Plans for the play’s L.A. debut are currently on hold.)

The new comedies are polar opposites of such seminal “end of life” gay dramas as Larry Kramer’s “The Normal Heart” and the still-touring “Angels in America” by Tony Kushner. They are light as a feather, nostalgic and almost in denial about the realities of AIDS. Rushing headlong from the harshness of the Kramer-Kushner period, these comedies serve up large helpings of romantic fantasy.

Their major theme is an age-old one: the difficulties of landing Mr. Right. One’s first Mr. Right, to be precise. None of the plays feature characters already in relationships. That would remove the fun-filled possibilities of finding the ideal partner.

In “End of the World Party,” Ranberg gets straight to the point. His premise concerns one of the basic conflicts confronting the testosterone-filled young male in America: how to balance the sometimes overwhelming need for sexual satisfaction with the desirability of a long-term relationship.

Ranberg never gets much beyond the question, cloaking his answer in the idea that by revisiting the morality of the 1970s--a time when, according to this play at least, gay men excelled at satisfying both desires--we can all still have fun.

That many relationships often founder as partners try to resolve this conflict is not dealt with by Ranberg, or by any of the other playwrights, though to do so wouldn’t necessarily mean that the comedy would end.

And then there’s the question of AIDS. All the plays but “Love Lies” seem determined to gloss over how a gay man’s assumptions about love and sex have changed. In Jordan Budde’s work, the revelation comes that Mr. Right has lied about his HIV status, though after that the play loses its rudder.

None of this needs to happen. There are laughs in the real world of post-AIDs dating, even in the sometimes poignant confusions surrounding who’s positive and who’s negative. This was a hurdle big enough to cause the hero in Paul Rudnick’s long-running “Jeffrey,” in a state of perpetual denial, to continue on the simplistic path of abstinence.

Yes, love and sex in the ‘90s are more complex but they are still lots of fun. Unfortunately, this is not terrain deemed appropriate for today’s “gay lite” theater.

The escapist stance of these plays is nowhere more explicit than when it comes to the presentation of the male body. No more wispy-thin AIDS physiques on stage, please. What the comedies display are hunks, and mostly naked ones at that.

These playwrights follow the dictum “to bare all is to tell all” with a vengeance.

The absence of clothes, however, doesn’t make for presence of lust. David Dillon’s “Party”-goers, for example, all lose their clothes by the finale but, devoid of emotional or even erotic content, Dillon’s weightless characters exhibit as much sexual spark changing a CD as they do touching each other. And in “Making Porn,” a look at the industry before and after AIDS, it’s not surprising that the antics of real-life porn stars J.T. Sloan and Blue Blake are more about zesty exhibitionism than eros.

“Love Lies,” again, is the exception. Budde not only uses nudity to generate some erotic potential, but also reveals the danger inherent in the relationship.

If earlier gay plays showed us a community embattled, sometimes against itself as well as an indifferent nation, the new comedies show the community as a maturing “family.” These characters may not be able to land a lover without humorous complications, but they still have an established network of gay male friends to help them through the night.

The family theme is bolstered by the role of the party, of course--get-togethers on Fire Island; the Black Party at the Probe on La Brea, a high point in the lives of the characters in “Love Lies”; and the games night in “End of the World Party.” It’s at such events that the gay family struts its stuff.

And these are happily exclusive occasions. In “Party,” “End of the World Party,” “Love Lies” and “Love! Valour! Compassion!,” there are no parents, no female friends, nor any representatives of the straight world. According to these playwrights, gay men can expect the same emotional support from their own kind that other Americans hope to receive from their traditional families.

At the end of “Party,” the characters offer a series of toasts. “You guys are my family.” “A toast to friendship.” And the seemingly obligatory, “To all the guys who have died.” Such sentiments take on greater validity when played to an almost exclusively gay male audience.

The comfort zone provided by the new gay family, however, has not challenged these comic playwrights to invent stand-out, highly idiosyncratic characters.

What we get in the main is a set of all-too-familiar gay personalities. Even Terrence McNally’s guests at the summer house seem like 1970s versions of characters this writer has already given us.

The return of the stereotypic character fits the general flight from reality these comedies promote. A stereotype can be funnier and far less confrontational than a character with whom we have to deeply empathize. In fact, it’s each play’s campiest and bitchiest character who has been received with the most enthusiasm by the gay audience.

In “Party,” for example, the Mr. Camp character, ostensibly a priest, is the star of the play. His sole purpose is to give sermons about his icons of homosexuality, albeit with a very narrow, traditional range: from Barbra Streisand to “Dynasty” to “thirtysomething.”

Is this revival of old-fashioned camp more than just a retreat from the literal and fantastic urgings of the AIDS playwrights? Does it indicate that 30 years after “The Boys in the Band” this exaggerated style still plays a significant part in contemporary gay male exchanges? Or is it more simply the easiest way to get a laugh?

After all, these playwrights are only out to stage a party, to revive the spirit of abandon from the 1970s. Serious soul-searching is always best left to the morning after. And the next wave of gay playwrights.

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END OF THE WORLD PARTY, Celebration Theatre, 7051 Santa Monica Blvd. Dates: Thursday-Sunday, 8 p.m. Ends Jan. 28. Price: $20. Phone: (213) 660-8587.

PARTY, Henry Fonda Theatre, 6126 Hollywood Blvd. Dates: Tuesday-Friday, 8 p.m.; Saturday, 5 and 9 p.m.; Sunday, 3 and 7 p.m. Ends Jan. 28. Prices: $30-$35. Phone: (213) 480-3232.

MAKING PORN, St. Genesius Theatre, 1049 N. Havenhurst Drive, West Hollywood. Dates: Closes tonight, 7 p.m. Prices: $20. Phone: (213) 650-7808.