THEATER REVIEW / ‘CHRISTMAS ON BROADWAY’ : Yuletide Vim : Plaza Players rate a 12 on scale of 10 for enthusiasm and an opening ovation for sharing proceeds with AIDS Care of Ventura.

On a scale of 10, give the producers and cast of “Christmas on Broadway” a 12 for good intentions, effort and enthusiasm. As for the other aspects of the Plaza Players Theatre Workshop presentation, here’s the evidence: You be the judge.

Forty-three songs, all having ties (some rather tenuous) with Broadway, are strung together in a revue. The show’s title notwithstanding, only one--”Santa Baby”--has any connection with Christmas. Because of the subject matter of some of the songs, this is not a show aimed at a family audience.

The show concentrates on musicals from the last couple of decades, with a few exceptions, and generally avoids numbers that have become theatrical cliches through the years. And it gives a few that have become cliches--such as “Tomorrow,” and “Send in the Clowns”--a figurative swift kick in the rear.

An attractive cast of 11 singer-dancers, most of them local, perform the numbers with tremendous vim. The costumes and Edgar Wood’s choreography are at least the equal of anything that’s been presented on local stages this year.

That--plus the producers’ donation of $1 for every ticket sold to AIDS Care of Ventura--is the good news. It was enough to earn a strong ovation from the opening night audience; those who stayed for the entire performance, that is.

“Christmas on Broadway” ran three and a half hours long on Saturday night; there have been shorter and more exciting productions of “Hamlet.” And, while many of the numbers were excellent, it wouldn’t be difficult to trim the show by as much as an hour and only the cast members who had their numbers cut would miss it. As it stands, licensing fees to use the vast number of songs must be staggering.

The musical accompaniment may please members of the audience with its fullness, or annoy them with its amateurism. The producers have run recordings of the various shows through an electronic device that theoretically removes the human voice, leaving only the instrumental parts. Legal and ethical considerations aside, it doesn’t work. A lone synthesizer would have been far better.

On several of the songs, the Ventura cast members are literally singing along with the original-cast stars. Only it’s difficult to coordinate exactly, so one voice generally lags a bit behind the other.

A live singer trying to shout over the tracks (as a few do), winds up sounding like Ethel Merman at the Hollywood Bowl. And, because the music is taken from records, when a version in the present show ends anywhere except where the original cast version ends, the result is sloppy, abrupt or both.

Although there’s a thin story line involving a cross-country airplane trip with “Christmas on Broadway” as the in-flight movie, the show has virtually no book, and the songs seem to have been chosen and placed at random.

Often, the comedy numbers fare best, including “The Tennis Song” from “City of Angels”; Michael O’Donoghue’s “Talk Dirty to the Animals” from “Gilda! Live on Broadway”; “Angry Guy/Lucky Day” from “Three Guys Naked from the Waist Down”; and a wonderful variation of “The Rain in Spain,” from one of the “Forbidden Broadway” series, in which a professor attempts to enrich Madonna’s brain. (A funny number, but if there’s one thing that the real Madonna is not, it’s stupid).

The versatile and mostly able cast consists of April Billings, Tricia Dumont-Carroll, Melora Dacayana, Irene Fodor, Roldan Evan Munoz, J. Mitchell Neill, Kimberlee O’Neill, Leila Perlmutter, Michael Perlmutter, Chris Wilson and Jeffrey Britt. Diane Clower Gilbert is credited with the tap choreography.

* WHERE AND WHEN

“Christmas on Broadway” continues through Dec. 20 at the Plaza Players Theater, 34 N. Palm St., in Ventura. Shows are at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday nights, and 7 p.m. Sundays. Tickets are $8 on Saturdays; $6 on Fridays and Sundays. For reservations or further information call 643-9460.