Entertainment

‘AFTERBIRTH’ SHOULDN’T HAVE BEEN BORN

AFTERBIRTH: Kathy and Mo’s Greatest Hits

At the Second Stage Theatre, 307 W. 43rd St. Through July 11. Call (212) 246-4422.

IN “Afterbirth: Kathy and Mo’s Greatest Hits,” Kathy Najimy and Mo Gaffney deliver more of their droll satire of modern American life, especially from a feminist point of view.

The duo, who are back onstage after their hit “Kathy and Mo Show” in the ’80s, have come up with some new material to go along with their old routines about the absurd challenges that contemporary life foists upon women.

And while the old stuff retains its comic bite, the new stuff is strained and unfunny, as if the two authors had really lost interest.

Of the 10 sketches in “Afterbirth,” two are new: one about the absent mothers in Disney cartoons, and the second about facelifts, told from the perspectives of two women, a Beverly Hills rich-bitch and a hard-working middle-class lady.

The actresses wrote all their own material for the show, which is competently directed by Mark Brokaw.

Early on in the show, they’re two Italian girls chatting about their boyfriends and the characters in “West Side Story,” and later, they’re two elderly Jewish women ineptly trying to order lunch in an unfamiliar hippie-veggie restaurant.

Both bits, although too protracted to be consistently funny, manage to tread the tightrope between condescending and adoring; however, a bit about a woman protesting an abortion clinic and bribing her restless youngster with a Big Mac topples over into contempt.

The only time I really laughed in “Afterbirth” was when a woman (Gaffney) comes into a country bar and sits down on a stool next to a rustic drunk (Najimy) in a big cowboy hat with a cigarette stuck to his upper lip, who keeps assuring her that “You look very, very pretty tonight.”

The guy (at least I presume it’s a guy but it doesn’t make no difference) keeps urging chicken wings and fresh drinks on her.

In sticking close to tightly observed people and refusing to judge them too easily, the piece is very funny and very true.

And, ultimately, it’s what the whole show shoulda been like.