THEATER REVIEW : Andrew’s Amazing Technicolor ‘Sunset’ : Techno and Acting Wonders Abound, but Characters’ Humanity Suffers

Something elusive and strange has taken possession of the Shubert Theatre Stage in Century City. Is it a musical? A movie? An opera? A soap opera?

*

All of the above. The American premiere of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s transmogrification of Billy Wilder’s classic film, “Sunset Boulevard,” is a musical that moves-walks-talks like a movie and sings like Italian opera.

Or rather Italianate opera.

No surprise in that. Grand opera is what Lloyd Webber aspires to when he’s not simply having fun with shows like “Cats,” “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” or “Starlight Express.” (See “Evita,” “Jesus Christ Superstar” and “Phantom.”)

But the most slippery aspect of the stage “Sunset Boulevard” is the strange coloration that the book by Don Black and Christopher Hampton, who also collaborated on the lyrics, has taken on.

Hampton and Black stick rigorously to the film script, even using some of its famous lines verbatim. But perhaps under pressure from the billowing, swirling, decorative and unabashedly sentimental score by Lloyd Webber--more apt for Scarlett and Rhett than Norma Desmond and Joe Gillis--they have surrendered Wilder’s dark, sardonic view of Hollywood for something knee-deep in gilt and guilt: Gothic, grandiloquent, grandiose.

While the key players and their dynamics remain essentially unchanged, the treatment by Black and Hampton, wedded to the romanticized portentousness of the score, reduces the characters to Grand Guignol stick figures, leaching them of any real humanity.

And yet . . . Thanks to passionate performers, to the fluidity of Trevor Nunn’s direction, to the sophistication of Andrew Bridge’s lighting, Anthony Powell’s fancy ‘40s costumes and hairdos, and the cinematic dissolves of John Napier’s design (including a car chase, the suggestiveness of moving shadows on scrims, and stackable sets that serve up simultaneous action), darned if there isn’t something utterly mesmerizing about the goings-on at 10086 Sunset.

The show is a Circus Maximus of technological wizardry designed to abet the operatic spin Lloyd Webber and company give the story. Everything about the execution of this piece, including the orchestrations (Lloyd Webber with David Caddick) and the musical direction (Paul Bogaev), is top-drawer.

Addicted as Lloyd Webber is to the grand gesture, everything in the musical is wildly overblown, too, from the lugubriousness of the mansion to the momentousness of the score. (The Harlequin romance aspects of his “Aspects of Love” spill over into this show, but so do fairy-tale ones from “Phantom.”)

The production careens maddeningly from schlock to showmanship and back again without missing a beat, and in the end it’s the actors who hold the trump cards and work the ultimate wonders.

Whatever Patti LuPone may be doing as forgotten silent screen star Norma Desmond in the musical’s London version, Glenn Close is a stunning choice for this Los Angeles run. An actress of consummate class and commanding presence, she also has the voice, daring and deportment for the role.

One may yearn for restraint here and there, but not at the risk of reducing the size of the performance. Note the haunting loneliness, the small terrors, the peevish imperiousness, the labored stride and telling old-lady stoop as she climbs the stairs to her room, clawing the banister like some crazed witch.

This Norma is part Gloria Swanson (owner of the film role), part Camille, part Theda Bara, part Violetta and part Morticia Addams.

Which is about right. Without carrying the analogy too far, you might say this is the Addams Family of musicals.

As Max, Norma’s devoted butler who had been her first husband and is her self-appointed protector, George Hearn looks every inch like Erich von Stroheim (who created the film role), but with a more compassionate edge. And of course, he can sing. His “The Greatest Star of All” is an oasis of genuine emotion in a strident landscape.

Alan Campbell acquits himself well enough as conflicted writer Joe Gillis, caught in a time and money warp, and Judy Kuhn brings a zesty graciousness to his love interest, Betty Schaefer. But the real passion lies with Close. This “Sunset Boulevard” ends, of course, with as melodramatic a mad scene as ever devised and Close plays it for all it’s worth.

It is the only way to go.

One has to surrender to this lavish musical’s unrepentant excesses or forever stay away. But to stay away is to cheat oneself of a rich if gaudy spectacle and a memorable performance. Temperamentally, this is not the Billy Wilder film, but it is at least as extravagant as a C. B. DeMille epic.

Somehow, that kinda fits.

* “Sunset Boulevard,” Shubert Theatre, 2020 Avenue of the Stars, Century City. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2 p.m.; Dec. 20, 8 p.m.; dark Dec. 24. Indefinitely. $25-$65; (800) 447-7400. Running time: 2 hours, 40 minutes.

Glenn Close: Norma Desmond

Alan Campbell: Joe Gillis

Judy Kuhn: Betty Schaefer

George Hearn: Max von Mayerling

Alan Oppenheimer: Cecil B. DeMille

Vincent Tumeo: Artie Green

Sandra Allen, Anastasia Barzee, Amick Byram, Susan Dawn Carson, Matthew Dickens, Colleen Dunn, Ed Evanko, Rich Hebert, Alicia Irving, Diana Kavilis, Lauren Kennedy, Luba Mason, Sal Mistretta, Mark Morales, Rick Podell, Tom Alan Robbins, Peter Slutsker, Rick Sparks Ensemble

A new musical based on the Billy Wilder film. Producers The Really Useful Company, Inc. and Paramount Pictures. Director Trevor Nunn. Music Andrew Lloyd Webber. Book and lyrics Don Black, Christopher Hampton. Sets John Napier. Lights Andrew Bridge. Costumes Anthony Powell. Sound Martin Levan. Musical supervision/direction David Caddick. Musical director Paul Bogaev. Orchestrations David Cullen, Andrew Lloyd Webber. Musical staging Bob Avian. Production supervision/stage management Peter Lawrence. Technical supervision Peter Feller, Arthur Siccardi.