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Try describing the action in Martin McDonagh’s dark comedy, “The Lonesome West,” and it sounds more dark than comedy.

There are the bachelor Connor brothers, the explosive Coleman and miserly Valene, who have just buried their father and whose relationship is a series of brawls interrupted only by volleys of insults. There’s Father Welsh, who has had so many crises of faith that one character vows “to report him to Jesus,” struggling with his failure to deal with his parishioners, which include at least three murderers and one suicide. The fourth denizen of this west of Ireland village (Leenane, the location of McDonagh’s plays, “The Beauty Queen of Leenane” and “A Skull in Connemara”) is Girleen, the pretty and sassy lass who is stealing poteen (that’s Irish for “moonshine”) from her own Da to buy a gift for the man she secretly loves.

But McDonagh’s play and director David O’Connor’s production at St. Stephen’s Theater at 10 & Ludlow in Philadelphia accomplish what seems to be impossible: Turning a work that is at bottom a poignant morality play (life is lonely enough without making it self-imposed) larded with Quentin Tarantino-like violence into, well, a laugh riot.

Coleman (played like a smoldering young Marlon Brando by Anthony Lawton) and Valene (a character once described as “tighter than a fish’s arse” played by Ross Beschler) are a modern-day Cain and Abel. These two sibling rivals fight over everything from packages of crisps to Valene’s holy figurine collection (which is broken every night, God bless the production’s “cast of thousands” sculptors and painters) to his insistence on marking everything that is his–and everything is–with a large V with his ubiquitous magic marker…

They bring local priest Father Welsh (a wonderful performance by young local actor, Luigi Sottile) beyond the point of desperation. (At one stage, bemoaning his inability to be taken seriously in Leenane, the priest shouts at Valene, “I’d have to kill half me feckin’ family to fit in here!”) Girleen, played delightfully by Genevieve Perrier, delivers the mail, wisecracks, stolen bottles of bootleg booze, and a dose of humor and compassion to these troubled men. She is literally the girl with the golden heart.

Of course, this being an Irish comedy, there’s also a sprinkle of tragedy and a hint that redemption, despite its often heartbreaking cost, is always possible. Love, as it turns out, does mean having to say you’re sorry.

“The Lonesome West,” a Lantern Theater Production, will have performances through October 14. Go to www.lanterntheater.org for times and to order tickets.

The Lantern Theater Company’s The Lonesome West
Running through October 14, 2007

St. Stephen’s Theatre
10th and Ludlow, Philadelphia, PA 19107
http://www.lanterntheater.org/

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