THEATER REVIEW : ‘CHARLIE BROWN’ : Peanuts Revived : Despite some foul plays, the gang from the comic strip still know how to please a crowd.

“You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” was one of off-Broadway’s biggest successes, with a first run of nearly 1,600 performances when it opened 23 years ago.

The 1967 show by Clark Gesner, based on the comic strip “Peanuts,” is a favorite of community and high school theatrical groups. It has been mounted by the Conejo Players for a series of Sunday matinees that concludes on July 15. On July 28 the production will move to Moorpark High School for one afternoon performance.

The Conejo production makes the most of a show whose popularity far exceeds its worthiness for inclusion among great theatrical literature. A comic strip that is based on the notion of children thinking and speaking like adults has been watered down for the stage: This is two hours of adults portraying children who speak like adults.

Like the comic strip and “Peanuts” television specials, the chronicling of a day in the life of the moon-faced Charlie Brown and his playmates is little more than a series of blackouts. The play adds several songs, none of which lingers in the memory more than a moment after the last notes have faded from the air.

We find crabby and bossy Lucy; her security blanket-bound but philosophical little brother, Linus; aspiring classical pianist Schroeder; fantasizing beagle Snoopy and perennial schnook Brown going through the familiar motions: a softball game, Snoopy’s imaginary dogfights with the Red Baron, Brown’s panting after the (unseen) cute little red-headed girl and so on. Missing are such Peanuts regulars as Pigpen, Sally, Woodstock the bird and Snoopy’s brother Spike.

The Conejo Players Theatre audience on Sunday consisted for the most part of the very young and quite old. It was the older members of the audience, doubtless, who most appreciated the humor and sometimes-arcane references. Youngsters would probably appreciate a brat like Bart Simpson to upset all this niceness.

Since the play is from the mid-’60s, a few topical references are a bit dated. One joke treats the idea of ZIP codes as a new thing. Later the long-outdated notion of postal zones is mentioned. The fact that those references remain fails to explain the reference to Barry Manilow, who didn’t have a hit record until 1974.

All that quibbling aside, praise should be extended to the cast, backing musicians, director Bill Polari and the production crew.

The show skips along merrily, and several of the characterizations are quite remarkable. Jim Holmes contorts his face until he bears an uncanny resemblance to Charlie Brown. Although the cartoon Lucy is a brunette, you soon forget that the actress playing her so convincingly crabbily, Kimberly Germain, is a blonde. And Mark Andrew Reyes comes close to stealing the show in his portrayal of a beagle without the benefit of a dog costume or makeup.

Richard Baker, Stuart Berg and Aileen-Marie Scott are also appealing in their portrayals of Linus, Schroeder and Peppermint Patty, respectively.

The music isn’t much, but the cast perform the songs with enthusiasm, backed by pianist Zachary Spencer, bassist Steve Bringleson, percussionist Ken Dayton and woodwind player Rhondda Dayton.

And in the one exception to the score’s drabness, Reyes’ Snoopy turns supper time into a production number--literally--choreographed by Gabriel Arciniega.

All in all, it’s a show that children can take their parents to without fear of embarrassment, and the air-conditioned Conejo Players Theatre is a pleasant place to spend Sunday afternoon. Adults are directed to the Conejo troupe’s concurrent production of “Children of a Lesser God,” playing Thursday through Saturday evenings.

* WHERE AND WHEN: “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” plays at 2:30 p.m. on July 1, 8 and 15 at the Conejo Players Theatre, 351 South Moorpark Road in Thousand Oaks. Tickets are $15 at the door, with no reservations taken. For further information, call 495-3715.