Jason Kanda's solo performance of Eric Yokomori's "Daredevil Blues" comes with a disclaimer: "Contains strong language and aberrant behavior."

Most of those words and actions come from the frustration of dealing with the obstacles life throws at you just for showing up. That kick-in-the-pants victimization accounts for the "Blues" part of the title.

But "Daredevil"? It might be that, like the comic-book hero, the central figures in this collection of 12 short monologues are blind to their own shortcomings, yet offer us the insight to see better than they do.

The character vignettes abound with issues: death and dying, father-son relationships, getting (or not getting) noticed, loved and laid. Each flows into the next as the stage manager calls out their titles without a discernable order and with a mounting intensity and absurdity.

An old man in a care home laments that he "used to be young" and pushes himself to "one last rash act of immortal arrogance" — over a piece of cornbread. A nervous father explains to his little son that his absent Mommy "loves you from a distance — from a Hefty bag in the city dump," but a thrice-divorced husband deals with rejection by bumming drinks and nonstop laughter.

A prisoner on a telephone call to his ex-girlfriend insists that he committed murder for her because "true love doesn't have to ask true love to kill," and a dying man in "They Got Me" has thoughts only for his Momma.

Suicide is the solution for a magician whose best rabbit died, but not for the teacher in "I Want to Live," who encourages his class to write themselves survival notes. An estranged son speaks to his father's coffin, "I said everything while you were alive, but you never listened."

Sex in "The Diagnosis" takes the form of an enema bag, while the protagonist in "The Human Race" simply begs any woman to accept his sperm, under any conditions she may choose.

While the monologues may be individually moving, jarring or absurd, they are collectively less important than Kanda's performance. Through a tireless two acts and 90 minutes of script (Kanda holds the stage by dancing to recorded tunes while the audience takes a short intermission), the actor becomes more important than the playwright in this production.

Granted, without words there would be no script. But without the performer, there would be no characters. Kanda changes tone, rhythm, mood and accent by turning on a dime — morphing from alien to general to boxer to hypnotist even in the context of a five-minute monologue.

Each is genuine. Each has been carefully rehearsed. None is surface or contrived.

Direction is credited to Rico and Jason Ellinwood, and a visible stage manager deadpans announcements and controls music and sound.

But the star is Kanda. Catch him if you can at a Kumu Kahua dark night.