A Coming-of-Age Story Where Few Dare to Go

Mark Savage can’t decide whether he wants to be Stephen Sondheim or David Dillon, the guy who wrote the male nudie show “Party.”

Savage is the talented director-writer-lyricist-composer of “The Ballad of Little Mikey,” a frustratingly immature coming-of-age musical that had a successful 1994 run at the Celebration Theatre. “Mikey” is back in all of his, uh, glory, this time at Highways in Santa Monica. This is a musical in which our fresh-faced, likable hero and five cohorts perform “Tap,” a paean to anonymous men’s room sex. As they eagerly strip down to their skivvies, flashing pecs and biceps, the actors wear the terrible, stricken smiles of people forced to serve the god of beefcake more than the god of text.

And yet Savage shows some real flair, particularly as a songwriter. His hero, the nice boy who forges his sexual identity while a UCLA freshman, is direct and engaging as he makes his discoveries. “I found them! / My people,” sings the winning Mark W. Smith, during the bathroom number. “No hassles / No waiting / Don’t have to bother dating.”

Later, Savage spins gold of a ballad that fills us in on the most heart-rending moment of Mikey’s story. The song, “Oh Mom, Oh Dad,” explores that extra rite of passage experienced by homosexuals--the breaking of the news to the parents--and the fear of abandonment that grips the heart of any young person at such a moment.

But Savage needs a book writer. “Mikey’s” narrative meanders. The story is framed by the mature Mikey on the verge of a nervous breakdown. His lover, Steve (Jon Philip Alman), is fed up with his inability to earn a buck and so he has decided to leave his law practice--as an advocate for gay and lesbian causes--and take a job at a corporate law firm. Mikey’s problems with Steve never grow or are resolved; they are simply alleviated. His major character trait is that he’s a devoted gay activist (as we are told over and over in the pretentious, final number), yet we have to take that trait entirely on faith. The only activism we see him perform is in leading a protest of a film (“Cruising”) he has not seen.

Looking like a young Michael Feinstein, Smith has a warm voice and robust presence, and he keeps the show down-home and centered during some of its more embarrassing moments. From his group of college buddies, John Price as an Oscar Wilde wannabe and Tobe Sexton as the self-designated leader stand out. Michael Greer is very funny as a befuddled professor in a first-act song, “Blah, Blah, Blah.”

That song is borrowed from the Gershwins, and Savage also quotes Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hart, Sondheim and William Finn, but he quotes them well. As an exercise, he should make himself write a show with no nudity. Not for modesty’s sake, but for his own good.

BE THERE

“The Ballad of Little Mikey,” Highways, 1651 18th St., Santa Monica, Thursdays-Sundays, 8:30 p.m. Ends Jan. 25. $20. (213) 660-8587. Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes.