Performing Arts

IRVING – If you've never quite understood why Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical plays were the dominant American theater pieces of the mid-20th century, you need to see Lyric Stage's Carousel. Those already in the know will want to see it twice.

The production that opened Saturday at the Irving Arts Center is the first fully staged version to use the original 40-piece orchestra since the premiere run 60 years ago. Under Jay Dias' musical direction, Richard Rodgers' most romantic, most poignant score shimmers and swells.

Carousel's most characteristic background is a starry night; this time the moonlight shines as brightly from the orchestra pit as from Julie Simmons' lighting design.

John Farrell's set, imported from Philadelphia, could look ridiculously old-fashioned, with its flat painted houses. But director Cheryl Denson and her cast prevent that: This Carousel pays homage to Broadway's traditional style of musical-theater acting, but interprets it with a subtlety and sweet sincerity that – aided by all those violins and deep brass instruments – repeatedly bring tears to the eyes.

Kimberly Whalen and Christopher Pinnella could hardly be bettered as the faithful-hearted Julie Jordan and her ne'er-do-well Billy Bigelow. The long musical scene in which they fall in love (but don't declare it) shows off her pure soprano and his robust baritone. You've never heard a more delicate "If I Loved You" – or seen a more delicate Julie than Ms. Whalen.

Billy Bigelow is one of the most difficult parts to fill in American musical theater. The groundbreaking London and New York revivals of the 1990s never found a leading man who was really satisfying both dramatically and vocally.

Lyric Stage has managed the feat with New York-based Mr. Pinnella. His voice may not have quite the ideal top and bottom notes; that sort of singer seems to have gone extinct after the 1950s. But he's still thrilling – and touching – in the great "Soliloquy" at the end of Act I, in which he imagines the child Julie has just told him they are expecting.

Oscar Hammerstein II made Carousel a parable contrasting passionate love with the homespun variety. Dara Whitehead Allen as Carrie and Jackson Ross Best Jr. as Mr. Snow make the case for respectability with charm – and with lots of their own fine singing. Natalie Arduino, who as Aunt Nettie gets two of the score's most famous numbers, at first sounds mannered in the style of Broadway contraltos of the '40s. Eventually, though, she delivers a beautifully modulated "You'll Never Walk Alone."

In fact, this Carousel is cast to strength, top to bottom. They don't make musicals like this anymore – and, until Lyric Stage proved otherwise, you'd have thought they didn't perform them like this anymore, either.

•Through Sept. 16 at Irving Arts Center's Carpenter Performance Hall, 3333 N. MacArthur Blvd., Irving. Runs 185 mins. $20-$45. 972-252-2787; www.lyricstage.org.