THEATER REVIEW : There’s a Place in O.C. for a Golden ‘West Side Story’ : This beautifully directed college production has a Broadway-quality look and a lead couple of deeply affecting magnetism. The cast captures the musical’s emotional range.

The piles of trash on the set look too carefully arranged. The first few gunshot-like notes from the orchestra sound like they barely got out of the barrel.

And yet . . .

Designer Charles Davis’ set opens up, one layer of huge, grimy New York tenements after another. Musical director David Anthony’s ensemble erupts into full power. And the Sharks and the Jets take over. Now we’re talking “West Side Story.”

And though this is “West Side Story” care of Golden West College, there’s almost nothing here to suggest that we might not be watching work by a very, very good civic light opera. As director Brandee Williams indicated last year with her giddy, delightfully retro “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” in this same Mainstage Theatre, she and the Golden Westers have a gift for musicals.

Even so, this show is unexpectedly remarkable, a perfect balance of the anticipated youthful energy with a serious elevation of craft. “Joseph,” after all, is a little warm-up exercise at best compared to Leonard Bernstein’s majestic urban epic, “Romeo and Juliet” transplanted astonishingly (yes, it’s still astonishing) from Verona to the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

*

Tony and Maria are sung and acted with galvanizing passion by Ivan Rutherford and Cindy Acevedo; the production is held together by their deeply affecting magnetism. A lesser couple well might have been overwhelmed by Davis’ giant set of floor-to-ceiling panels, walls and platforms--as close to a Broadway-scale set as this reviewer has seen in a college theater.

But Rutherford’s extraordinary command--both of Bernstein’s demanding register range and of Tony’s loyalties, divided between his Puerto Rican lover and his white gang pals--fulfills every ounce of the character’s tragic capacity.

*

Acevedo’s very different approach ideally complements his sense of scale: She elicits delicate intimacy with nearly every note and line, skillfully building her emotional pain until the lid explodes in the last, heart-wrenching scene.

Too bad that pain is missing from Adrienne Johnson’s blandly pop version of “Somewhere.” But the rest of the cast conveys the musical’s full emotional range, from Jamie Jacoby’s great firecracker Anita burning up the house with “America,” to Mathew Arietta’s as Jet leader Riff staying real, real “Cool,” to the Jets (especially Mark Reilly, Brandon Ibanez and Jeremy L. Pierson) delivering the caustic comedy of “Gee, Officer Krupke.”

The big numbers are pretty terrific. But it’s the small moments that make you realize how attentive director Williams has been to every detail. Before this, we never really heard Doc (a wonderfully bedraggled Art Frankel), the drugstore owner who employs Tony, saying wistfully to him, “I never had a Maria.” It’s a kind of dramatic haiku, playing off splendidly against the all-encompassing sights and sounds of a showstopper like “Tonight.”

*

What doesn’t stop the show is Tim Hill’s choreography, a lame modification of Jerome Robbins’ original work. But thanks to fight coach Eric Hudson, the jumping, punching and knifing are cruelly, beautifully effective.

* “West Side Story,” Golden West College Mainstage Theatre, 15744 Golden West St., Huntington Beach. Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 3 p.m. Ends May 22. $12-$14. (714) 895-8378. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.

Cindy Acevedo: Maria Ivan Rutherford: Tony Jamie Jacoby: Anita Michael Parra: Bernardo Mathew Arietta: Riff Luis F. Guizar: Chino Heather Uttecht: Anybodys Rollo Sternaman: Krupke Art Frankel: Doc

A Golden West College Fine Arts Division production. Music by Leonard Bernstein. Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. Book by Arthur Laurents. Directed by Brandee Williams. Musical director: David Anthony. Choreography: Tim Hill. Set: Charles Davis. Lights: Bill Georges. Costumes: Susan Thomas Babb and Sonja Browning. Sound: Scott Steidinger