Music: The Civilians perform "In the Footprint: The Battle Over Atlantic Yards" at the Annenberg Center's Hal Prince Theater

URBAN RENEWAL is complicated, rife with backroom politics and big-business interests, accusations of class and racial prejudice.

Planners tout lofty goals, sometimes attainable, to win project support. Meanwhile, they're displacing communities that had been intact for decades, even centuries.

Here in Philadelphia, the ever- expanding reach of the University of Pennsylvania has often been at odds with its University City neighbors and even the student body. As a Penn student myself, I was active in Save Open Space (S.O.S.) protests, aiming (with success) to preserve the College Green from Penn's edifice complex.

With all that in mind, I've got to give Penn's Annenberg Center props for bringing in a challenging piece of docudrama (with music) called "In the Footprint: The Battle Over Atlantic Yards," which might reopen wounds with showgoers and participants in companion discussions.

(While the show closes on Jan. 28, the biggest panel on renewal/gentrification happens three days later with participation from former Mayor John Street and developer Bart Blatstein, among others.)

Developed by a new-style Brooklyn, N.Y., theater company called The Civilians, this intriguing (though sometimes rambling) mosaic of a one-act shines a bright light on stuff that's been happening in The Civilians' own back yard. Namely, the transformation of a rundown Brooklyn rail yard and residential/industrial neighborhood with a new sports arena (nearing completion) for the New Jersey Nets basketball franchise, plus enough high-rises (all but one now on hold) to eventually hold 300,000-plus residents.

"Footprint" offers up the thoughts of the borough president who craves another team for Brooklyn, a powerless city councilwoman, community activists who want in on the spoils, and residents who've been dazed and confused by the workings of eminent domain and redlining yet remain resistant to moving even when big bucks are waved under their noses.

For more insights on the process of the play and the company, I turned yesterday to the show's 36-year-old composer, Michael Friedman. A Chestnut Hill native (and Germantown Friends grad) who didn't go to Penn but "has friends who went and teach there," Friedman can certainly see the irony in Annenberg's support of this play, previously well-received in New York and Boston.