TV REVIEWS : PBS’ ‘On the Town’ an Aural Pleasure

“On the Town,” an irresistible American stage musical and a Broadway hit in the closing months of World War II, retains at least half its charm in a vocally strong concert presentation taped with the London Symphony Orchestra under the animated baton of Michael Tilson Thomas (“Great Performances” tonight, 9:30 p.m., Channel 28).

Given the continuing freshness of the 1944 show, half a musical theater loaf in this case is still recommended watching. What’s entirely absent from this concert interpretation--and which must seriously disappoint dance fans and lovers of the 1949 Gene Kelly/Frank Sinatra/Vera-Ellen/Ann Miller/Betty Garrett movie version--is Jerome Robbins’ choreography and sweeping Coney Island and Times Square ballet numbers.

Minus the dance elements, the production, notwithstanding choice archival footage of 1940s Manhattan, is essentially reduced to an aural experience. But since we’re talking Leonard Bernstein’s first big Broadway success, not to mention sparkling book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green (who both appeared in the original show and who serve as on-camera narrators here), that still leaves several memorable tunes, among them “New York, New York,” “Lonely Town” and “Lucky to Be Me.”

Coming a year after the debut of “Oklahoma!” and a dance forerunner to Bernstein’s “Westside Story” (which further used ballet to advance plot purposes), “On the Town’s” tale of three skirt-chasing sailors suddenly let loose in the Big Apple on a 24-hour leave is a timeless romantic fantasy.

“On the Town in Concert” makes the most of its vocal strength with Thomas Hampson, Kurt Ollmann and David Garrison as the swabbies hitting New York for the first time and falling in love like loose cannons with a subway poster beauty of the month, Miss Turnstiles (Marie McLaughlin), a lustful cab driver (Tyne Daly, who uncurls a raucous “Come Up to My Place”) and a lascivious anthropologist (the pearly-voiced Frederica von Stade). Cleo Laine also appears, naturally enough, as a nightclub singer.

What’s more honest about this TV variation than the old movie is that the three female characters are all seen as sexually hungry, eager to jump in bed with the sailors. What’s disconcerting about the gobs, on the other hand, is that they’re costumed in white dinner jackets instead of white sailor suits. That may befit a concert but it does dilute some of the flavor of Gotham in wartime.