Kicky ‘Chorus Line’

A trip to see “A Chorus Line” is like a visit to an old friend, and for some in the audience, it’s difficult to contain the joy. As the dancers take their places on the famous line, happy, anticipatory aahhs exhale across the auditorium; the same happens during the opening strains of “What I Did for Love.”

Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities is fortunate to be able to count on this nostalgia, for while its re-creation of the original Michael Bennett staging is blessed with several winning performances, it is also marred by a few off-pitch singers and an overall want of magic.

In overseeing this restaging of Bennett’s 1975 tribute to chorus dancers, Sam Viverito, an old hand at such reproductions, is hampered by an uneven collection of performers. Several are “A Chorus Line” veterans who have had ample opportunity to hone their performances; others are new to the piece and simply not up to it.

Fortunately, the stronger performers are allotted most of the stage time as we eavesdrop on these physically and emotionally wrenching dance auditions--a metaphor, in a larger sense, for the daily auditions we all face for acceptance, love and more.

As Cassie, who is attempting to rejoin the rank and file after a failed try for Hollywood fame, Christina Marie Norrup gives “The Music and the Mirror” a rich, ringing vocal outing, and although her movements on opening night were, at times, imprecise, she conveyed the passion of someone truly dancing for her life.

As Diana, Cindy Marchionda compellingly relives the pain of early rejection in “Nothing” and later pours her heart into that love song to the theater, “What I Did for Love.” Kelli Fish is electric as the comic Val, who has had reconstructive work done to every conceivable part of her body, and Laura Soltis smolders as the flirtatious Sheila.

As Paul, Michael Albert Simms holds the auditorium spellbound during his emotional tale of self-acceptance, and as Larry, the assistant who leads the auditionees through the dance combinations, Seth Hampton comes closest to executing Bennett’s choreography with the grace, athleticism and all-out joyousness with which it was intended.

The momentum established by these performances is slowed not only by the clunky work around them, but by the refreshment-stand break that has been inserted into this originally intermissionless show.

Chalk this one up as close but not quite.

BE THERE

“A Chorus Line,” Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, 1935 Manhattan Beach Blvd., Redondo Beach. Tuesdays-Fridays, 8 p.m.; Saturdays, 2 and 8 p.m.; Sundays, 2 and 7 p.m. Ends June 27. $30-$45. (310) 372-4477. Running time: 2 hours, 45 minutes.