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Funny, they don't look like swisters.

Sisters, either.

Hung up on logic? Hang out elsewhere.

"I know that by casting two actresses that are so physically different from each other that it will be a problem for some people to be able to suspend their disbelief -- but some people are going to go along with it because the play is such silly fun," says Courtney Sheets, director of "Swisters," debuting tonight as this season's final bow for Las Vegas Little Theatre's Fischer Black Box, and winner of the theater's second annual New Works Competition.

Goes like this, Black Boxers: You've heard of TV's "Wife Swap"? Meet Las Vegas Little Theatre's Life Swap.

Two infant girls are switched at birth at the hospital. (No, the playwright doesn't moonlight as a "One Life to Live" staff writer. ... Though he could.)

Disgruntled sibling Frankie grows up poverty-stricken, while the other, Jill, is now a princess of privilege. Frankie's understandably irked, showing up at Jill's upscale doorstep, locking the Botoxed suburbanite in her own closet, then assuming her life, one to which she feels gosh-darned entitled.

"It's very (Christopher) Durang in its feel as a farce," Sheets says. "It starts out simple, then the playwright throws all these twists and turns at you. It really will keep the audience on its toes."

Grass-is-always-greener assumptions turn into grass-is-always-weedier reality as Jill's manicured life -- and lawn -- eventually reveal the comic rot below. Her bratty goth daughter is blackmailing Frankie/Jill, her neighbors have entangled her in a deadly plot, and her accountant spouse doesn't turn out to be who -- or what -- she envisioned as a dreamboat hubby.

Ain't life less than grand?

Competition winner/author Stanley Toledo didn't create the "swisters" as identical twins, but still as look-alikes. Director Sheets, however, has lent "Swisters" a plot-twister, casting an African-American actress (Tiffany Rae Lynn) as life-usurper Frankie, and a white actress (Mary Foresta) as the wife whose life is usurped.

"I chatted with (Toledo) when we were casting, and I didn't have two actresses who came to audition who were close enough in resemblance, but I told him I have these two wonderful actresses who could really make it work," Sheets says. "He's been very open to what I bring to it as a director."

Theatergoers shouldn't notice that Jill's family doesn't notice that she has switched races and faces?

"That's what we're playing with," Sheets says. "Everyone knows that isn't really Jill, but they don't want to be the one person who says, 'You're not Jill.' The way they look at it is they have to change to someone different, and she really is a nice person. The family members see a quality in Frankie they really wish Jill had."

Topping a field of 38 contest entries nationwide, Toledo, a San Francisco civil rights investigator for the U.S. Department of Education and part-time scribe, was set on the "Swisters" path by a headline.

"It was based on a short newspaper article about two women who discover they were switched at birth," says Toledo, whose winning submission is his second full-length work, along with nearly 50 short plays.

"In the article, both women were very unhappy with their circumstances and how their lives turned out and the family they were with. I was very intrigued and thought, what if one wasn't satisfied and wanted to reclaim the life she thought she had been cheated out of? I'm hoping the audience has fun with it."

Compatibility with the Black Box -- an outlet for edgier, offbeat, experimental theater, as opposed to more mainstream fare on the troupe's mainstage -- was essential for crowning "Swisters" the winner, earning it a "world premiere" production.

"I thought it had enough whimsy and attitude to put it in the Black Box and not have our patrons question the content," says TJ Larsen, who produces shows in the venue, along with Sheets.

"And it's stage-able," Larsen adds, noting that, given the Black Box's cozy space, the piece had to be logistically reasonable, with a cast of fewer that 10 actors and small sets. "One of the top (contenders) had 15 locations and was different from what our audience would expect."

Which doesn't suggest that Black Boxers will expect the twisty turns of "Swisters."

Altering an oldie-but-goodie ditty: Swisters, swisters -- there were never such devoted swisters.

Sisters, either.

Contact reporter Steve Bornfeld at sbornfeld@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0256.