New Musical in Manhattan

Park Avenue (book by Nunnally John son & George S. Kaufman ; music & lyrics by Arthur Schwartz & Ira Gershwin ; produced by Max Gordon) kids the multiple marriages & divorces of the ultrasmart set to a fare-thee-ill. Nunnally Johnson and George Kaufman are not lacking in the wit that made them famous -- the four-times-married wives and five-times-married husbands come in for a series of brittle wisecracks and a sprinkling of balmy ones. But there has seldom been more unswerving allegiance to a single joke and long before the end it has ceased to be entertaining.

Nor is the rest of the show much of a help. Ira Gershwin's lyrics are neat enough, and the mainstay of two lively ditties, Don't Be a Woman If You Can and Land of Opportunitee; but Composer Schwartz gives you nothing whatever to hum. The dancing is agreeably tame, the chorus is more slight than select, the costumes lack charm and the singing lacks body. Leonora Corbett (Blithe Spirit) and Arthur Margetson (Around the World) are helpful performers but no miracle-workers. Park Avenue never catches the mood, or captures the lure, or achieves the high spirits of genuine musicomedy.

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