If I were a betting man (and who isn’t in the theater?), I’d wager that we’ll be seeing a lot of Jeffrey Hatcher’s new play over the next few years. Not here in New York – John Tillinger’s production of “A Picasso” at Manhattan Theatre Club will probably satisfy the civic appetite for a while. But out there in regional-theater-land, brace for a Picasso bonanza.

Mr. Hatcher has imagined a 1941 encounter between the wily Spaniard and a blonde Nazi interrogatrix. As the two-hander unfolds in real time (70 minutes), we learn that Miss Fischer’s superiors in the culture ministry have demanded that she find a Picasso for some shadowy exhibition. She has summoned the artist to a subterranean chamber in occupied Paris, insisting that he authenticate three works that may or may not be his.

It’s no coincidence that the pieces date from different eras of Picasso’s life. One shows a baby, another shows a youthful self-portrait, and the third is a late jumble of potentially political symbols. Did he create them? If so, when? And how? As Picasso describes why they are or are not his handiwork, he also talks about himself. A lot.

“A Picasso” is a biopic, of a sort. Miss Fischer’s queries and Picasso’s replies – sometimes grudging, sometimes expansive – effectively cover the key facts of his life. Born to the Ruiz family of Spain, he takes his mother’s name and sets off for Paris. Hijinks with Apollinaire and the boys soon follow, as does a pissing match with Matisse, and enough trysts to strike envy in Wilt the Stilt’s, er, heart.

Complications abound, the sort of shifts that I imagine will keep audiences here, and in Seattle and all points in between, interested. Miss Fischer is less of a neutral bureaucrat than she seems. Before long, she presents Picasso with a kind of Sophie’s Choice of canvases. Mr. Hatcher doesn’t want us getting all morose, though. Picasso may be speaking to a German, and Miss Fischer to a Spaniard, but they’re really directing their lines to an American audience reared on sitcoms.

“I hear you hide gold in the closet where your soap should be,” says Miss Fischer.

“If you’ve spent any time in France, you’ll know soap is more precious than gold,” replies Picasso.

Roll the laugh track. Elsewhere, Miss Fischer sets up the jokey genius:

“The Fuhrer paints, you know. He does landscapes.”

“Yes, but he has problems with the borders.” Zing!

Comic gold is not what will attract every actor in America to this role, but I can already see them lining up. Who among them could pass up the chance to exude Picasso-level machismo, and to toy with a thick Spanish accent? Prowling the small MTC stage at City Center, Dennis Boutsikaris accomplishes both with aplomb. He seems to relish exercising the Great Artist prerogative to talk about himself in the third person whenever it suits him. The self-referential gems include “Picasso likes deals” and “Picasso always has a woman!” and “Apollinaire may have wanted to f– Picasso, but no one f–s Picasso!”

The thousand co-stars of the thousand lucky actors who will play Picasso over the next few years, will have their share of fun, too. Miss Fischer is a picture of frosty, buttoned-up sexiness. With her blonde hair pulled back and a severe gray jacket and skirt, Jill Eikenberry exudes poise as this conflicted minister of culture (or “cowcha,” as she would have it). When she reveals that she was once involved with an artist, Picasso tells her the man should have tried to paint her. “He asked, but I said we should go straight to bed; more efficient,” she says. I realize a chilly, no-nonsense character was well suited to oppose the hot Iberian painter, but the image of Germany as a nation full of martinets does grow old. Surely some German somewhere has left his shirttail out, though I can’t recall having seen one on stage or screen – not since Sgt. Schultz, anyway, but he hardly counts, as he had Col. Klink to keep him in line.

Eventually – inevitably – Mr. Hatcher’s play swings around to “Guernica.” We are treated to a few minutes about the deep meanings of art, its political implications, and the responsibilities of the artist to his homeland. It feels de rigueur, uninspired. The same goes for Allen Moyer’s scenery, which is attractive and functional, but discouragingly literal: slab floors, vault ceiling, light filtering in from street level above. The many future productions of this play would do better to leave more to our imagination.

How do you capture in fiction someone who is barely believable in fact? That is the trouble dogging Mr. Hatcher’s play. His workmanlike approach manages to let its subject dazzle only once. Picasso recalls how he used to draw with matches that had just burned out. “Problem is sometimes a little red coal of fire’s still alive in the tip, and – whoosh! – the picture goes up in flames. …My father would shout, “Pablito! The devil is in your hands!” An exceptionally sharp piece of writing there – one coming soon, no doubt, to a theater near you.

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