Tasty Side Dishes in a Low-Cal Musical

If Sandy Wilson’s musical “The Boy Friend” were a dish, it would be the kind that leaves you hungry an hour later.

Wilson’s paean to the Roaring ‘20s, British-style, is also an uncredited tribute to Cole Porter’s brand of musical, the kind where the boy and girl will obviously get together by the end and where the obstacles in their way are as slight as the fun and easy tunes. Wilson’s songs aren’t in Porter’s class (of “The Boy Friend’s” 13 songs, nary a one is a standard), but a solid production can provide a playground for the right actors.

Still, this is one low-cal show.

Perhaps recognizing that, director-choreographer Tommy Finnan III has added some tasty side dishes for the revival at Actors Forum Theatre.

For starters, charismatic Champagne Powell serves as an emcee, setting the scene of Powell’s silly tale of young rich lovers who try to disguise themselves as humble working-class types. Still, though Powell has a rich jazz voice, it’s hard to see how ‘50s-era jazz has any place in the era of Bix Beiderbecke. Powell also literally opens the curtain, but something should be done to repair the severely frayed fabric--a charmless element in an evening that’s all about charm.

Then, after unhelpfully providing cymbal-crashing support for the sometimes shaky two-piano accompaniment, Bobby Barron comes on between Acts II and III and nearly steals the show with a glistening tap-dance number. Decked out in a silk red sailor suit (one of several of this show’s dazzling uncredited costumes), Barron’s act affectionately quotes from Gene Kelly in both “Anchors Aweigh” and “On the Town,” while inadvertently pointing out the sloppiness in a lot of Finnan’s group choreography.

The capper is the entry of mind-reading couple Glenn Falkenstein and Frances Willard, who pulled off a set of amazing stunts Saturday, while recalling for Actors Forum regulars the theater’s preceding production about a mind-reading act trapped behind the Iron Curtain, “The Great Sebastians.”

The result is a lot of little, fabulous entertainments that combine for a full evening, but also upstage Wilson’s silly show. The group singing needs a lot of work, and while Kathryn D. Ball and Chett Gunhus as the main lovers make for a fine pair, her voice utterly dominates his. There’s a fair amount of stiffness in what should be an effortless flow, but there’s never enough of Toby Berenson as a superbly witty Madame Dubonnet, stealing the show along with Brad Slocum’s loopy Percival.

BE THERE

“The Boy Friend,” Actors Forum Theatre, 10655 Magnolia Blvd., North Hollywood. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 3 p.m. Runs indefinitely. $20. (818) 506-0600. Running time: two hours.