Broadway's Bell Goes Ding! Dong!

By WILLIAM A. HENRY III

TITLE: GUYS AND DOLLS

AUTHOR: MUSIC AND LYRICS BY FRANK LOESSER; BOOK BY JO SWERLING AND ABE BURROWS

WHERE: BROADWAY

THE BOTTOM LINE: The greatest of all American musicals gets the rousing revival it deserves.

One might imagine that Laurence Olivier could have commanded any role he chose, and conjured up virtually any showcase production to feature it. But the actor of the century died thwarted because he was unable, while running Britain's Royal National Theater, to finance a production of Guys and Dolls starring himself as the lowlife gambler Nathan Detroit. It's unclear whether Olivier could have brought off this plum musical role -- the legendary Shakespearean's song-and-dance talents went largely untested during his career, and his American accents tended to be unplaceably wayward -- but his taste was impeccable. As the Broadway revival that opened last week demonstrates anew, Guys and Dolls is the finest blend of memorable tunes, witty yet in-character lyrics, robust humor, tender romance, streetwise sass and overall style that the American musical theater has ever produced.

Like the Damon Runyon stories from which it grew, this outwardly hard, cynical piece is in truth a moralizing fable about honor among thieves, the rehabilitation potential of practically anyone, and the redemptive power of love. As envisioned by director Jerry Zaks and set designer Tony Walton, it is also a paean to an urban zest, vitality and security that no longer exist and probably never did. The show's look is deliberately old fashioned, a combination pastiche and homage to the days when scenery was painted backdrops and choruses always ended up at some point as lines at the front of the stage. The flavor of this rendition is deliberately jokey, an acknowledgment that the gangsters who so heavily populate its story are sentimentalizations; they may dress worse than John Gotti, but they behave infinitely better.

The period-piece treatment may seem unnecessary and distancing. But this is a cavil compared with the production's many virtues, from its costumes, a literal laff riot of cacophonous color, to its performances. Faith Prince's over-the-top yet completely convincing medley of mannerisms as Nathan's loved one, Miss Adelaide, is the central delight of the evening. But the fulcrum of the story is Peter Gallagher's blend of immense charm with an appropriately edgy and dangerous aura as the big-time gambler Sky Masterson. Vocally, the whole show is strong. Prince and Nathan Lane, as Detroit, are supremely articulate in the comic songs, Gallagher and the bell-voiced Josie de Guzman, as the missionary Sarah Brown, rich and exuberant in the ballads. The smaller characters are played appropriately broadly yet with real zing.

The greatest asset, however, is neither the show's nonstop movement nor its unselfconscious ribaldry, but the fact that it is back where it belongs: out of the cast-album bin at record stores and igniting Broadway again.