Lyle Kessler's ominous comic thriller, Orphans, will open the season for LA's Deaf West Theatre Company, Nov. 10.

The show, which began previews Nov. 7, will be performed in American Sign Language, with voice interpretation for hearing audiences through the Sennheiser Infra-Red System. Also featured -- for the first time -- will be supertitles, made possible as a gesture of goodwill by the L.A. Opera.

Orphans tells of two grown but childlike brothers who live together and support each other through petty theft. Rivalry rears its head when a a very rich but dangerous man becomes their father figure.

Lyle Kessler's play premiered in 1983 at Los Angeles' Matrix Theatre, won the Drama-Logue Award there, and then played regionally, including stints at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre and Off-Broadway. A Santa Monica- based dramatist, Kessler's The Watering Hole was produced on Broadway, and his Burning Bright won the New York State Council On The Arts Award.

Deaf West's production of Orphans is a collaboration with the Sacramento Theatre Company (STC), and the show will play there April 6 to June 10, 1997. Stephen Rothman, who directs Orphans, is the artistic director of STC. In the cast for Orphans are Chuck Baird, Troy Michael Kotsur and Joseph Anderson. Sets are by David Potts, lighting by Ken Booth, and costumes by Mara Parian.

For tickets ($15-$20) and information on Deaf West's Orphans, call (213) 660-4673 (voice) or (213) 660-8826 (TTY).

-- By David Lefkowitz