A Sondheim Revue Rolls Merrily Along

Lucky Los Angeles. New York was an unwitting tryout town for the Stephen Sondheim revue “Putting It Together.” Now, more than five years later, the new and improved version landed with a bang Sunday at the Mark Taper Forum.

There probably will be a few refinements before the show moves on to wherever. But the Taper production has so much fizz and cohesion that it’ll be the model and the standard for future renditions.

This latest “Putting It Together” offers sensational performances by not only Carol Burnett but also by the rising star Susan Egan. The three onstage men are not at that level, but two of them are very good. We also get clearer characters and a simpler semi-story than New York did, a brilliantly whimsical visual design, and the pleasure of more than 30 Sondheim songs orchestrated by the master’s longtime collaborator Jonathan Tunick and played by an eight-piece backstage band. Director Eric D. Schaeffer and musical staging whiz Bob Avian blended the parts into a glittering whole.

The show begins with a few words from a man who looks like an usher. He’s actually Bronson Pinchot, poking fun at Sondheim rival Andrew Lloyd Webber, the pretensions of the Taper, audiences in general and Sondheim himself, as he slides into Sondheim’s “Invocation and Instructions to the Audience.” This segues into the introduction of the other actors via the title song.

Ostensibly about the art of making art, the song in this context also refers to “putting together” a life. For the rest of the material focuses not on art but on the changes of heart and perspective that adults experience, particularly the romantic couplings, rivalries and disillusionments. So the most represented shows are “Company,” “Follies” and “Merrily We Roll Along” (five songs each) and “A Little Night Music” (three) rather than “Sunday in the Park With George,” “Sweeney Todd,” “Into the Woods” and “Assassins” (one major song from each). Sondheim’s last show, “Passion,” is missing. But three songs he wrote for the movie “Dick Tracy” are here. The movie’s “More” is a showstopper for Egan.

The setting is a posh Manhattan party. Designers Bob Crowley and Wendall K. Harrington’s skyline is a raucous cross of vertical and horizontal images. Crowley’s back wall features small platforms at various levels above the stage--perches for individual characters to illustrate the isolation, even the claustrophobia, that can be felt at a party. The rise and fall of small pedestals in center stage furnishes Burnett with an irresistibly funny moment.

Harrington’s clever visual quips, in her projected images, supplement Sondheim’s lyrical ones. Lighting designer Howard Harrison’s hot neon borders and cooler blues and pastels underline the action. Bob Mackie’s cocktail-hour costumes look glitzy and sophisticated with the inexplicable exception of a large, ugly insignia on Burnett’s white jacket.

Burnett and John McCook play Amy and Charles, the wealthy, long-married couple who host this soiree. These characters’ names are drawn from Sondheim’s lyrics (there was confusion over this in the earlier version). Burnett’s unerring comic instinct and belting voice are in great shape, and she makes the breathtaking “Not Getting Married Today” a crystal-clear tour de force. But she also tones down her presence when necessary.

McCook, who replaced another actor during rehearsals, is the cast’s weak link. Although his look is more age-appropriate than that of the actor who played the role in New York, McCook brings nothing distinctive to the role, and his singing occasionally sounds muffled and slightly off-pitch.

Egan and John Barrowman portray younger guests whose romance is still tentative--”God, I hope this guy’s the one,” says Egan in one of the few unsung lines. In the New York staging, this ingenue was a maid, which led to the jarring inclusion of “Everybody Ought to Have a Maid”; with that song missing, the role is better conceived, and Egan executes it with tremendous panache.

Barrowman is almost too good-looking for his own good, in terms of creating a characterization, but he and Egan are an undeniably sexy couple, and his singing is equally gorgeous. Pinchot pops up often as the Observer, who guides us through the evening’s shifting moods. He has a jaunty, wry quality that bubbles out of him with ease, which he puts to good effect in “Buddy’s Blues.” His occasional tendency to squint in bright light is a bit distracting.

This version chucked 11 songs from the previous selection and substituted 10 new ones. Burnett magnificently renders “The Ladies Who Lunch,” which the previous star Julie Andrews reportedly shied away from because of her accent. The faux-French flirtation “Come Play Wiz Me,” from “Anyone Can Whistle,” has been dug up for Burnett and Pinchot. “Unworthy of Your Love” is a more fitting representative of “Assassins” than the “Gun Song” previously used. But why eliminate the rewritten “I Could Drive a Person Crazy”?

Sondheimaniacs will quibble over such matters, but the bottom line is that “Putting It Together” is a genuinely captivating entertainment.

* “Putting It Together,” Mark Taper Forum, 135 N. Grand Ave. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2:30 p.m. Also Nov. 23, 8 p.m.; dark Nov. 26. $38-$47. (213) 628-2772. Running time: 2 hours.

Carol Burnett: Amy

John McCook: Charles

John Barrowman: Barry

Susan Egan: Julie

Bronson Pinchot: The Observer

A Center Theatre Group production in association with Cameron Mackintosh. Music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. Directed by Eric D. Schaeffer. Musical staging by Bob Avian. Orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick. Musical director Jon Kalbfleisch. Set by Bob Crowley. Costumes by Bob Mackie. Lighting by Howard Harrison. Sound by Jon Gottlieb. Projections by Wendall K. Harrington. Associate choreographer Jodi Moccia. Production stage manager Mary Michele Miner.