It’s sweet, charming, easy to like and harks back to an earlier era when good always wins and the villains—if they could be called that—are laughingly given their just desserts, coated with wit and a good-natured punch. Black is black, white is white, and every scene in this affable universe is peppered with stunning song-and-dance numbers intended to coax you into celebrating along with the rest of the perpetually smiling cast.

That, in a nutshell, is “Singin’ in the Rain,” the musical theater version of the 1952 Hollywood movie that’s playing at The Theatre at Solaire until Sept. 13. It is cut from the same cheery, cheesy cloth of family-oriented musicals like “The Sound of Music” and “Mary Poppins,” although lesser known when it comes to the stage version.

Forget complex plots, shadowy villains and self-questioning angst and just enjoy the ride, for the musical, translated from screen to stage by Jonathan Church, is inarguably spectacular. The lack of dramatic tension may make things occasionally appear too bland for a contemporary audience, but getting over that hurdle allows one to just enjoy three hours of nonstop entertainment.

Lovely pair

The story is set in the mid-1920s, as film producers and actors grapple with the transition of the movies from silent films to talkies. But debonair leading man Don Lockwood (the Gene Kelly role played here by Duane Alexander) is more focused on pursuing his lady love, Kathy Selden, a stage actress who has to make do as a film extra to pay the rent (Bethany Dickson plays the role essayed by Debbie Reynolds in the movie).

Alexander and Dickson make a lovely white-bread, innocent-as-apple-pie couple. Their smart-aleck protector, who also acts as a foil to the bumbling Hollywood producers, is Cosmo Brown (essayed by Donald O’Connor in the original, here by Steven van Wyk). Like his costars, Van Wyk hits his notes right and can effortlessly light up a scene with his dancing.

However, his pairing with Alexander suffers in comparison with the Kelly-O’Connor duo, whose contrasting personalities sharpened much of their shared scenes in the movie. O’Connor was the goofy funnyman to Kelly’s leading man. But in this production, Alexander and Van Wyk are like two peas in a pod; they both come across as uniformly too clean and too boy-next-door for one to act as a counterpoint to the other.

The one character who steals her scenes is Lina Lamont, Lockwood’s sultry costar whose classic blonde-celebrity looks hide the voice of a banshee.  Her jealousy over Lockwood’s love for Selden and her hilariously disastrous efforts to retain her stardom in the new sound-driven movie landscape are the obstacles that our heroes have to overcome. And Taryn-Lee Hudson attacks the role with aplomb, relishing her caricature character unapologetically.

Excellent

The production values of this touring production are uniformly excellent, heralding its international origins, which are a collaboration of several international theater companies such as the Stage Entertainment and Chichester Festival Theatre, David Atkins Enterprises, Dainty Group, Lunchbox Theatrical Productions, as well as local partner Concertus Manila.

Scenes proceed at a snappy pace, the stage transforming from a glittery movie premiere night one minute to an array of long-legged showgirls headlining a party the next, then segueing to an almost nonstop tap dance sequence on Broadway’s main street complemented by a dazzling burst of colors.

Nacio Herb Brown and Arthur Freed adapted the movie’s musical numbers into musical theater form with a preservation that eerily echoes the film’s soundtrack. “Good Morning,” “Make ‘em Laugh” and the titular “Singin’ in the Rain,” which ends Act One, are guaranteed showstoppers, and the adaptors knew enough not to change the movie’s best parts.

This is a feel-good production, and the show’s producers make no pretensions otherwise. The 1952 movie was made by then-industry leader MGM, but this stage version could easily have been produced by Walt Disney.

Good-looking, perpetually smiling stars, easily discarded villains, an ensemble as impeccably dressed as their leads, a storybook landscape—not even a downpour can dampen the spirits of the characters in this production. And it is that cheeriness that the show hopes its audience will take with them after the curtain comes down.

“Singin’ in the Rain” runs at The Theatre at Solaire until Sept. 13. Visit www.ticketworld.com.ph or call 8919999.