Neil LaBute is a polarizing playwright. Recently, it seems he’s caused more drama offstage than onstage (see: his nasty response to a negative review of his most recent play, "reasons to be happy"), but regardless of anyone’s opinion of him as a person, he certainly writes provocative plays.

“Fat Pig,” now playing at the Hudson Mainstage in Hollywood, is classic LaBute. One of his older plays (it originally opened off-Broadway in 2004), the story follows office drone Tom (Jonathan Bray), who finds himself attracted to the unwaiflike Helen (Deidra Edwards). In the same vein as LaBute’s other man-child protagonists, Tom is trying to find out if he is a strong enough person to date the woman he loves, even in the face of ridicule from his detestable colleague/best friend Carter (Nick Stabile) and Jeannie (Kirsten Kollender), a (very thin) coworker whom Tom had previously dated.

Director Alexis Jacknow keeps the production low-key, letting LaBute’s play do most of the work. Hazel Kuang’s set design is simple, but effective, and undergoes a very nice transformation to become a beach for the final scene.

Unfortunately, the acting is uneven. The main problem comes from the noticeable lack of chemistry between Helen and Tom, which makes LaBute’s conversational prose come across as stilted and artificial in their scenes together. Kollender tries to make the shrewish Jeannie likable, but the character is ultimately too grating. Surprisingly, Stabile makes Carter almost sympathetic, despite how horrible Carter is as a human being. But Stabile’s presence has a positive effect when he’s onstage, and the dialogue flows at its smoothest when he’s in a scene, even though he’s saying completely reprehensible things.

“Fat Pig” is a play that will force the audience to confront some deep, dark parts of their souls, a process that can be extremely uncomfortable. So for that journey of self-discovery alone, it’s worthwhile to see a production of “Fat Pig”—but one could hope to see a more consistent production than this.

“Fat Pig” plays at Hudson MainStage (6539 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood) through June 1. Tickets are $30. More information can be found at plays411.com/fatpig.

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