Hexagon incompatible with Automodal?

I'm trying to use the Automodal module for editing nodes, also the Nodereference Explorer module for managing nodereferencing. Neither of these will open for me and give similar behavior: the modal pops up in a small box and the throbber spins for awhile. Eventually the modal closes and either returns a blank page or the original underlying page. I have tested Garland, to make sure this wasn't something in my choice of modules and configuration, and both work fine in Garland. I can work around this somewhat by using Garland as my admin theme, but I'm hoping to use Automodal in places where Hexagon is the visible theme.

The only Firebug data I have scrounged up (it flashes up and then goes away quickly) is:
jQuery.ui||(function(c){var i=c.fn.rem...el:null,distance:1,delay:0}})(jQuery);

Seems like this might be similar to:
http://drupal.org/node/863816#comment-3259792

I haven't ruled out that there is something I have done in my config somewhere that is making this happen.