The Cast Photo by Joan Marcus

A daunting notion, perhaps, but that hasn't stopped the company that previously turned a collective reading of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" into a thrilling eight-hour event they called Gatz from taking on Joyce's masterwork and making it their inventive own.

Still, "The Great Gatsby," published just a couple of years after "Ulysses," is an American novel, of which most New York audiences would have at least a passing familiarity. "Ulysses" is another thing altogether, a modernist stream-of-consciousness Irish whirlwind of a book that challenges the reader (or, in this case, the audience) at every turn. It's also a lengthy work, nearly seven times as long as "Gatsby." Indeed, a notable 1982 word-for-word presentation of "Ulysses" by Ireland's national radio network clocked in at close to 30 hours.

So bring out the scissors and trim away. Elevator Repair Service's Ulysses runs just under three hours, including an intermission. Its 18 episodes are presented in segments, separated by fast-forwarding transitions that are clearly indicated for us through visual and auditory cues. A large analog clock on the rear wall lets us know where we are during the course of the tale that takes place in the span of a single day. Take note that time here is a malleable measure, capable of running forward and of backtracking as suits the story.

Under the sure, confident hand of director John Collins, who founded the company 35 years ago, the production is blessed with a versatile, praiseworthy, and tight-knit ensemble of seven, portraying 39 characters who meander all over Dublin (a street map is helpfully displayed at one point) on June 16, 1904. Sometimes they are loners whose thoughts we are privy to; at other times they randomly or purposefully interact with one another. What we hear is simply what we overhear, leaving us to make what we will of the unfolding events.

Key roles are those of the Leopold Bloom (Vin Knight), sort of a Jewish-Irish Walter Mitty through whom Joyce's humanistic side is carried, including shining a light on some virulent antisemitism; Bloom's lusty, unfaithful wife Molly Bloom (a role split between Dee Beasnael and Maggie Hoffman); and Stephen Dedalus (Christopher-Rashee Stevenson), a young, cynical intellectual, long regarded as a stand-in for Joyce himself, for whom Bloom, mourning the loss of a son, serves as something of a surrogate father. Rounding out the strong cast are Mr. Shepherd, Kate Benson, and Stephanie Weeks, whose take on Martha, Bloom's pen pal "girlfriend" is a real hoot. Interestingly, there is nary an Irish accent to be heard, though that would perhaps be a bridge too far to be added to the demands of unpacking Joyce's challenging text.

The production itself is divided into two distinct styles. The first half takes the form of a reading, with the cast generally seated at a trio of tables. Following the storyline becomes a matter of trusting the actors and the director and allowing everything to wash over you, as if you were watching a foreign-language production with no subtitles.

After intermission, you enter another world altogether. The bland set, lighting, and sound design of Act I has basically disappeared, replaced by a nightscape/dreamscape of visual imagery (set by the design collaborative dots), moody lighting (by Marika Kent), and heightened sound (by Ben Williams). Even the omnipresent clock takes on a new role, doubling as the moon. It is all a turnabout from the quasi-realism of the first half and sweeps us into a surrealistic vortex that is largely focused on sexual desire and every manner of bodily effluvia, culminating in Molly Bloom's famous final soliloquy which ends both the book and this production.

Ulysses is a bold production that both enlightens and challenges us to wander, sometimes aimlessly, through the world that James Joyce left for us to decipher. There is no Rosetta Stone to provide a definitive translation, but Elevator Repair Service has certainly offered up its own worthy addition to the infinite ways of "misreading" the enigmatic text.