Amusing Muses in a bad-movie send-up

NEW YORK -

Xanadu

is the most outrageous thing on 14 feet. The tootsies belong to the seven Muses (I know, there are supposed to be nine Muses; don't ask) who turn the stage of the Helen Hayes Theatre into a chaotic madness that only their dad, Zeus, could engineer.

In this case, the king of the mythical Greek gods must be channeling through the playwright Douglas Carter Beane, responsible for last season's hilarious The Little Dog Laughed. Beane was hounded by Xanadu's neophyte producers to take a miserably conceived 1980 movie musical of the same name and turn it into a stage version.

He relented - and picked apart the film, which starred Olivia Newton-John and Gene Kelly, embracing all its dumb excesses, then magnifying the whole thing and twisting it into a new work that's rat-tat-tat funny. The film, which now has a cult following, was shot with a straight face. Under Christopher Ashley's direction, the stage version, which opened last night, is strictly for side-splits.

Beane kept the main story, about a Muse and her sisters (two are played on stage by guys) who come down to Earth to rescue a suicidal artist in Venice, Calif., and much of the show is done on the roller skates that were that neighborhood's signature footwear - unfortunate for actor James Carpinello, who injured a foot skating in rehearsals. For the time being, the artist is being portrayed, sung and propelled by Cheyenne Jackson (of Thoroughly Modern Millie) in fine fashion; his tenor is as nicely chiseled as his looks.

The Newton-John role, the Muse Clio, is superbly delivered by Kerry Butler, the original Penny in Hairspray, who zooms sweetly around the stage and neatly punches up a song. The fine Broadway veteran Tony Roberts is the real-estate speculator who makes it possible for our artist hero to convert a fallow theater called Xanadu to what he insists will be an "apex for all the arts": a disco roller rink. During the rehab, Clio falls in love with the mortal, against mythological rules.

The show retains the film's songs, a mixture of Electric Light Orchestra and Newton-John performances that spawned several hits, including "Magic" and "All Over the World." The stage score adds other songs by the same writers, Jeff Lynne and John Farrar, notably "Evil Woman," mockingly delivered by two Muses, the super-talented goofer Jackie Hoffman and Mary Testa, a vision of feminine cunning.

Choreographed by Dan Knechtges as if he were an animator, the show's not just part juke musical, part self-referential, and mercilessly irreverent - most surprisingly, it's done virtually without a nasty word or a sexual reference. You don't need to first sit through the movie, although Xanadu blossoms with nasty allusions to it, from Butler's ludicrous Aussie accent that mimics Newton-John to the man who pops up with a large fan to give Butler's dress the wind-whirl it had on film.

Beane gives the Muses their own characters and even explains their place in mythology. His assaults on American culture zing like laser beams aimed at mirrors, turning back on themselves. "I am confused," says one Muse to another. "We're Muses of inspiration. What are we doing in a theater?" Zeus, also played by Roberts, looks ahead from his 1980s vantage point: "Creativity shall remain stymied for decades," he predicts. "The theater? They'll just take some stinkeroo movie or some songwriter's catalog, throw it on stage and call it a show." Well, yes. But in this case, hardly.

Book by Douglas Carter Beane, music and lyrics by Jeff Lynne and John Farrar, directed by Christopher Ashley, choreographed by Dan Knechtges, costumes by David Zinn, sets by David Gallo, lighting by Howell Binkley, music direction by Eric Stern.

The cast: Kerry Butler (Kira/Clio), Cheyenne Jackson (Sonny), Tony Roberts (Danny and Zeus), Jackie Hoffman (Calliope), Mary Testa (Melpomene), André Ward (Terpsicore), Curtis Holbrook (Thalia), Anika Larsen (Euterpe), Kenita Miller (Erato), David Tankersley (featured skater).

Playing at the Helen Hayes Theatre, 240 W. 44th St., New York.

Tickets: $41.25-$111.25. Information: 1-800-432-7250 or www.xanaduonbroadway.com.

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