Unbridled vitality sweeps up crowd at 42nd Street at Aladdin Theatre

Friday, May 7, 2004 | 8:53 a.m.

What: "42nd Street."

Where: Aladdin Theatre for the Performing Arts.

Rating (out of five stars): ****

Forget the story. It's straight out of the Horatio Alger school of plotting.

But "42nd Street" is more than a simplistic tale of good triumphing over adversity; it is a spectacular production filled with energy, vitality and gaiety.

You can't sit through the musical comedy and not leave the theater feeling that maybe the world isn't so bad after all.

For a few minutes, you forget your troubles and exalt in the glow of the pure theatrics.

This revival of the 1980 Broadway production (itself a revision of the classic 1933 movie, which was based upon a novel by Bradford Ropes) danced its way into the Aladdin Theatre of the Performing Arts on Thursday.

If you appreciate good theater, you have three more days to experience one of the best road show productions to come to Las Vegas in years.

The entire cast is superb, from perky Shannon O'Bryan as ingenue Peggy Sawyer (Ruby Keeler's role in the film) to Daren Kelly as director Julian Marsh and Marcy McGuigan as aging star Dorothy Brock.

The dance numbers are inspiring, the colorful costumes awesome, the story hokey -- an excuse for the tap dancing and for the singing of such classic numbers as "Lullaby of Broadway," "Shuffle Off to Buffalo," "You're Getting to be a Habit With Me" "We're In the Money" and "I Only Have Eyes for You."

The original Broadway production, which ran for more than eight years, was directed and choreographed by Gower Champion, who died shortly before the curtain rose on opening night from a blood disease.

Essentially, "42nd Street" is about a play within a play ("Pretty Girl") being produced during the depths of the Depression.

Through a series of circumstances a naive, aspiring singer/dancer/actress is placed in conflict with a veteran performer in the twilight of her career.

It's the same plot that drove the Bette Davis film "All About Eve" and the Broadway version of the Davis film, "Applause."

Sawyer arrives too late to audition for the legendary Marsh's latest musical, but she is befriended by several members of the cast, and they convince the gruff director to hire her as an extra.

The gullible, innocent girl from Allentown, Pa., is bright eyed and brim full of enthusiasm, energy, confidence and talent.

She is surrounded by veterans who have been through the mill and are not so enthusiastic. They are professionals who at one time had the same zeal as the new kid on the block, but over the years they have come to realize they will only be bit players and not stars.

"You are like a speck of dust on this stage, indistinguishable from the other 40 specks of dust I put there," Marsh tells Sawyer.

"I know that Mr. Marsh," she gushes, her naivete shining through. "But put all those specks of dust together and you have something alive and beautiful that can reach out to thousands of people we've never seen before."

"Broadway dreams, Sawyer," Marsh says. "We've all had them."

"I mean to hold onto mine, Mr. Marsh."

"So did I. Sweet dreams kid."

"They are. At least I am a speck of dust in your show."

"42nd Street" is a fairy tale, a story about the American dream of persevering and achieving success.

It is colorful, romantic, wholesome and idealistic -- which perhaps makes it out of place in a world afflicted with jaundice.