This Friday, Zombie Joe's Underground on Lankershim Boulevard premieres their new play, "Attack of the Rotting Corpses." If you're a fan of the classic George Romero zombie films, or recent hits like "Zombieland" and "Shaun of the Dead," ZJU's new show gives you a chance to see some undead corpses live.

"Basically, the play starts and some hours before they shut the water off because the dogs from drinking the tap water started acting a little funny," Zombie Joe said. "This picks up just after we find out from the plumber that there was an evil endoplasmatic microbe in the water supply that rots you out from the inside out. That's where we're picking up, so the residents are turning into flesh eating corpses, rotting corpses at this point."

Set at the 50 Peachtree Luxury Living condominium, Blue Caribbean concierges Vic (Rod Sweitzer) and Mack (Denise Devin) are used to accommodating the residents. By the end of the show they'll be swinging axes and wrestling zombie dogs.

"They're sort of our antiheroes," Zombie Joe said. "They take us on the journey basically. The residents are all kooky. They're very similar to a lot of the character in our real lives, the people in our lives, sort of with a microscope on them for the fun of the show."

Mack is only the latest character Devin has played in a Zombie Joe production. "She's the normal person in the play over which the action bounces off of," Devin said. "Basically, she's about to have a bad day. She's doing her best to stay calm and professional and a concierge. It gets out of hand. I don't want to ruin it. And she loses it."

Zombie and Devin have been partners in life and theater for 10 years.

"Yeah, we're life partners," Zombie said. "We've been together for a long time, 10 years now. She's the lead actress, lead director of the group. She packs a punch. We do full dance productions as well."

When theatergoers enter the storefront at 4850 Lankershim Blvd., they walk through the lobby to the intimate theater space. There are only about 50 seats, 20 in the front and 30 or so on the side. The stage is the empty square with the 50 Peachtree address on the wall, and the concierge desk. This is more set design than most Zombie Joe productions.

"That's a lot," Zombie admitted. "We do have blocks, black blocks here. We will use blocks for levels but we don't really do furniture all that often."

The concierge desk, draped with a blue curtain, will begin with only a phone and a clipboard on it. It will ultimately be crowded with axes and other implements of zombie impaling. Zombie is in the business of catering to die-hard enthusiasts of the living dead.

"Here we do a lot of it," he said. "'Urban Death' has been our biggest hit in our history. That's been running for almost six months nonstop here. We do it in New York as well. For us it's important that you see it done well, that you see some real lifelike scary zombies, so that's important."

The ZJU crew put a lot of effort into zombie makeup to discolor the skin, and blood and guts to make it nice and gory. Even more attention goes into the performance of zombie actors like Kimberly Morgan, Spy Kitten and Gordon River.

"No matter how good your effects are though or your makeup, if your performances aren't there, you won't be able to sell any of it," Zombie Joe said. "So, we're constantly drilling the performances to make it scary. Also, the sense of surprise. Even grotesqueness is very scary for people. I'm not sure how scary this show's going to be yet. It's sort of funny."

Also, some of the actresses who begin fully clothed may end up in a state of undress.

"There's a little bit of nudity in the show," Zombie Joe revealed. "I think we have it in the shows, I think the whole group as a whole feels that there's a little more skin that goes along with the horror genre. Yeah, I think we do a lot of skin here, depending on what show we're doing."

"Rotting Corpses" is open to all ages though.

"Being that it's theater, anyone can come," Zombie said. "This show we recommend at ages 15 and up because of the subject matter and the content. We've been reaching younger people lately. We've always been like a younger person's theater so I'd say 18 or even 16-years-old up to about 30 is our audience."

That said, don't count the senior theatergoers out.

"We get 80, 90-year-old people come to see the shows," Zombie said. "They love us. Older theatergoers love our theater because they stay awake. They're exciting. The show's only like 55 minutes long so older people like it because they're not going to get home really late at night. Very old, 80, 90-year-old people come out. They love it. They might not always understand it, but they get a thrill out of it."

Early in the show, Doria (Stephanie Walters) and Cindy (Oriko Ikeda) begin arguing about their dogs. They won't notice that Skittles (Lauren Salandra) Paisley (Chris Hodge) have gotten ravenous until their pets are already chowing down on their owners. Zombie took inspiration from a condo where he once worked.

"It's based on sort of my experiences at 50 Bayard in Williamsburg in Brooklyn, when I was there up until a few weeks ago," he said. "We're running Zombie Joe's there and here, so this is a fresh play on the experiences. The characters in this play are based on the residents at 50 Bayard. A lot of dog stuff. They were really into their pest and sometimes there'd be dogfights so this is sort of an expounded version."

When zombified Caterina (Morgan) and Damon (River) eat a Pad Thai delivery boy, they'll spill his guts all over the stage. Don't worry, the audience won't get wet.

"No, they won't," Zombie assured. "We don't ever touch them. They're completely safe. We never assault the audience."

Vic and Mack will protect the viewers from any real zombie danger. Devin enjoys being on the front lines, as it were, with the crowd.

"It's intimate and I feel like as an actress and also when I'm an audience member, because I see every show, it's an intimate and very exciting theatrical experience," she said. "I think that both sides of the stage get a real theatrical experience. That's kind of hard in LA where it's all very film oriented and not as theatrical as we do here. It's all theater. It's not for film and TV. It's all loud and big and in your face, but with reality, and I think the audience gets an experience. It's a good time obviously but also has a real experience. The intimacy is also fun because it's small, so you're really up close and up front. It's very special. It's very exciting."

Being that close to her fans, Devin must be able to spot the fans who come to every show, right?

"Okay, I'd be lying if I said there hasn't been the time or two that I've noticed someone I know," she said. "But generally speaking, surprisingly enough, even with just our guerrilla lights, you can't see much past the feet. I don't actually see much past the feet believe it or not. The audience can, but I don't think the actors do."

For Zombie Joe's regulars, all of the above must sound like business as usual. For newcomers daring to venture into the backroom of Zombie Joe's Underground, expect a visceral show, with a detailed theatrical philosophy.

"I think it's like progressive Theater of Cruelty," Zombie said. "Our foundation is like a Theater of Cruelty, like Artaudian style with a little splash of Stanislavski. Atonin Artaud wrote 'Theater and Its Double.' Our style really draws out of Artaudian style, Theater of Cruelty. We do Shakespeare [at Zombie Joe's], so our style is sort of a mutt style. Chekhov is very influential. The way we perform out a lot is very Brechtian. The Artaudian is a Theater of Cruelty roots to it. We used to be full sex and violence, the real thing. Now years later, it's toned down a little bit."

"Attack of the Rotting Corpses" runs Fridays and Saturdays at 8:30 p.m. from Oct. 22 through Nov. 6. For reservations, call 818-202-4120 or visit www.zombiejoes.com.