Kingly, but revises tarnish the crown

More than one brief shining moment attends “Camelot” at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts. Whether this handsomely appointed touring revival of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe’s 1960 adaptation of T.H. White’s “The Once and Future King” improves a legendary problem show is a trickier proposition.

Start with headliner Michael York as King Arthur, at once too mature for the role and affably apt casting. York’s singing is just passable, some beats tentative, yet the heartfelt “How to Handle a Woman” and Act 1 curtain speech indicate where his respectable effort will be after more performances.

Opposite him, Rachel York (no relation) is wonderfully suited to Guenevere. At the reviewed performance, her microphone malfunctioned at “Simple Joys of Maidenhood,” which she sold over an amplified orchestra, a triumph of technique over technology. Elsewhere, her reinstated “Take Me to the Fair” and reactions throughout typify York’s triple-threat command.

As Lancelot, the rich-voiced James Barbour brings star presence and welcome humor. Shannon Stoeke is an ideally odious Mordred, the bastard son who destroys Arthur’s democracy, though cutting “Seven Deadly Virtues” is a mistake. Time Winters can’t do more than dodder as Pellinore, but the house loves him, and the ensemble is stalwart, with Eric Anderson luxury casting as Merlyn.

Director Glenn Casale keeps things peppy, sometimes to a fault, and oversees a beautiful physical production. Set designer John Iacovelli, costumer Marcy Froehlich and lighting designer Tom Ruzika go for broke, with references to Tolkien and Rackham as well as “The Mists of Avalon.”

However, some revisions and additional material by Michael A.M. Lerner (the lyricist’s son) are less felicitous. “Before I Gaze at You Again” should establish Guenevere’s struggle as Lancelot departs on quests, underscoring the irony.

Here, it launches Act 2, in the “If Ever I Would Leave You” slot and makes little sense in the new context. Worse, “If Ever I Would Leave You” replaces Guenevere’s “I Loved You Once in Silence” at the climax, an unforgivable deletion -- the chamber scene turns on poignancy, not a showstopper.

Dan Mojica’s choreography of pageantry works well enough, but his pelvis-centric dances and musical director Craig Barna’s tribal-drum charts in “The Lusty Month of May” are intrusive. Truncating the ensemble’s “Guenevere” jettisons its function, making the battlefield reunion between the leads hasty and the finale less moving than written. The less said about the flying sequence in “Follow Me” the better.

Audiences for whom Disney-ABC television musicals are adequate examples of the form may not mind the theme-park aspects. Die-hard fans of this show, the apotheosis of the Rodgers and Hammerstein tradition, have their memories to consider.

*

‘Camelot’

Where: La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts, 14900 La Mirada Blvd., La Mirada

When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays

Ends: Jan. 28

Price: $37.50-$45

Contact: (562) 944-9801

Running time: 2 hours, 35 minutes