What the butler saw at the Bruka By Joe Gosen, Outpost contributor In this package: Not all cheesy lounge acts and Elvis impersonators Open mike night at Great Basin Brewery Scallywags at the Blue Lamp Sharks in the Wall   It's Friday night and I'm finally out on a date with my wife. We don't get out as much as we would like, but when we do it's nice to know that not all night life in Reno revolves around smoky bars, pick up lines and loud bands. Tonight we're just a couple blocks south of all of the casinos on Virginia Street. As we approach First Street, we see a small light illuminating the doorway of a dark building. Inside, we find colors brighter than any casino. We settle in and prepare to experience entertainment unlike any other in town. It's community theater. Bruka Productions offers basic theater in the converted lobby of the old Masonic Lodge downtown. No fancy stage. No elaborate sets or props. Just good acting in an intimate setting. Twenty mismatched couches, a couple of over-stuffed recliners and a few rows of folding chairs form a semi-circle around the stage floor. If the seating were any closer, the audience would be in the play. Tonight, Joe Orton's "What the Butler Saw" opens. It's a zany play, full of sexual innuendoes, set in a psychiatrist's office A diverse crowd packs the theater a half hour before the show. Some warm their cold hands and tummies with warm cups of hot tea. Others quench their thirsts with cold beers and chardoney. Couples in their 60s squeeze into a couch next to a group of college students. Kim Finnerty and friend Melissa Rogers settle in on a couch in front of us. Rogers, 26, grew up in Carson City and has lived in Reno for seven years. Like us, this is her first experience at Bruka. This is Finnerty's second show. She saw 'Bent,' a play about the plight of gays in the Holocaust, a month ago and got on the mailing list. Finnerty said it was a wild show. "This is great," Rogers says during intermission. "I like the coziness of this place. It's real laid back. It's fun to see new talent on stage trying to make it in acting." Rogers, who generally doesn't go to the clubs or seek out the bar scene, was expecting her first Bruka experience to be outrageous. And it was. "This was good entertainment," she says. "You can't go to a movie, have popcorn and a Coke for this price. I know I'll come back again to another show." Other shows planned at Bruka in 1997: Mother Courage and Her Children, Betrayal, A Streetcar Named Desire and Hair. copyright 11/15/97 Nevada Outpost http://www.jour.unr.edu/outpost