BARYSHNIKOV, COMPANY IN VEGAS: CLASSY GAMBOLING

The names heralded in humongous letters on billboards further up the Strip belong to Johnny Mathis, Debbie Reynolds and Engelbert Humperdinck.

But the conspicuous attraction on the supersign outside the Aladdin Casino is none other than Mikhail Baryshnikov. There his likeness flies in the glitzy sky, frozen in a grand jete amid the neon splendors of quaint neo-penal Bagdad architecture.

It isn’t a mirage.

Baryshnikov and a baker’s dozen of would-be stars of his American Ballet Theater are devoting most of the summer to one-night stands on the road. Their lofty and lucrative mission is to bring classy pops programs to communities that don’t usually enjoy the pleasure of such exalted company.

The Aladdin Theatre for the Performing Arts isn’t exactly a cultural mecca that demands comparison with the Met or the Bolshoi. It normally houses rock concerts and show-biz extravaganzas.

In order to reach the entrance, the intrepid balletomane must stroll through a gauntlet of slot machines, electronic poker apparatuses, keno games and bingo orgies. The auditorium itself is a 7,500-seat monstrosity whose air-conditioning system roars like thunder but wafts only the faintest of breezes in this sultriest of climates.

Some 2,000 seats remain unsold Saturday night. A resident spokesperson claims that this is intentional; sight lines are severely obstructed at the extreme sides. Be that as it may, Vegas’ elite musters a reasonable facsimile of mass hysteria for the most romantic, best-publicized danseur of them all, and Vegas’ elite pays up to $75 for the privilege.

Unfortunately, the local aficionados don’t get to see a great deal of the great danseur. He appears only in one minor ensemble piece and in two extended pas de deux.

Still, that is more than Los Angeles got to see of him this year. Baryshnikov chose to sit out the Ballet Theater season at the Shrine because of injury, pique, disinterest, distraction, inadequate preparation, the conflict of administrative duties, or all of the above.

For most impractical purposes, the touring showcase of Baryshnikov & Co.--that’s what the package is officially called--harks back to balletic vaudeville. Showy ensembles, sure-fire hit solos and polite funk pieces dominate the agenda.

The show uses costumes but no sets. More curious, it uses no orchestra. But, where most comparable ventures settle for canned music, this one enlists an amplified piano, an amplified violin and a synthesizer--repeat, a synthesizer--in the pit. Some of the sounds are raucous, some quaint, some strange, some tinselly. For $75 a seat, Vegas might have expected more.

Baryshnikov settles for a token appearance in the warm-up exercise, “The Class.” This is one of those harmless, mildly competitive, let’s-pretend-we’re-just-practicing routines. Peter Fonseca organized the fleet choreography, and Lynn Stanford provides the quasi-improvisatory, generally jazzy, essentially supportive keyboard meanderings onstage.

Just before intermission, Baryshnikov returns for a dancer’s-digest survey of Act II of “Giselle.” Although he moves and mimes with his vaunted poetic authority, the bravura endeavors seem a bit rusty by his own highest standard.

Young Amanda McKerrow introduces a Giselle of exquisite potential. Still, the climactic scene seems anticlimactic isolated in this potpourri.

At the end of the evening, Baryshnikov returns for the smoldering passions of Twyla Tharp’s “Sinatra Suite.” He now allows some of the slinky, gum-chewing, love-me-and-hurt-me indulgences to flirt with vulgarity, but his wistful, erotic charm and slick, quirky virtuosity triumph over the danger of distortion.

Elaine Kudo remains his perfectly torrid victim, siren, foil and counterforce.

The non-Baryshnikov offerings, all heartily applauded, prove more notable for spirit than for individual distinction.

Deirdre Carberry (a fouette wizard in “Class”) joins Bonnie Moore and Peter Fonseca for a dutiful traversal of the peasant pas de trois from “Swan Lake.”

Robert La Fosse creates an innocuous little blind-man’s-bluff divertissement for himself and the charming Leslie Browne called “Rapaccini’s Daughter,” to tunes of Berlioz. Later they complement Carberry and the willowy Cynthia Harvey in a rather prim approximation of Balanchine’s ode to Gershwin, “Who Cares?”

Cheryl Yeager and Ross Stretton muster the filigree of the “Raymonda” pas de deux briskly and crisply. Susan Jaffe, her arms undulating in the rubbery Plisetskaya tradition, makes a tour de force of the poor old “Dying Swan,” but slights tragic pathos in the process.

The management, incidentally, gives away a mimeographed program slip that contains only the most basic credits, and for $5 sells a measly souvenir program that contains lots of photos of Baryshnikov, a few biographical notes and not a word about the choreography or the music.

Meanwhile, Aladdin’s house organ informs us that Siegfried is playing at the nearby Frontier Casino. Yes, Siegfried!

The pulse quickens, but in vain. The gentleman in question turns out to be no Wagnerian superman, just a “superstar of magic.” He works with a partner prosaically named Roy.

Even in modern Vegas, mirages have their limits.