Theatre Funny Girl at Agassiz this weekend and next

STOCK COMPANIES all over America have been playing Funny Girl since the property was released a couple of years ago. No doubt they all lack something. The elaborate scenery perhaps. Or the audience. And of course they all lack Streisand.

But surely only a Harvard production could lack what most acting companies have in excess ethnic flavor. The Radcliffe Grant-In-Aid production of Funny Girl plays the story of a young Jewish New York comedienne with a cast of well groomed aristocrats. This leads to some of the worst and the best moments of the evening. The worst: Phil Gabrielli is competent but ridiculous as suave Jewish gambler Nick Arristein. He plays him like Cyril Ritchard dipping his pinky finger into something icky. John Cook as theatrical entrepreneur Flo Ziegfeld tries hard but is equally unlikely. The best: a Ziegfeld production number called "His Love Makes Me Beautiful." Eight deadpanning preppies running around with sequined mirrors create an infinitely better satire of a Follies extravaganza than a hundred would-be Eddie Cantors-the Busby Berkeley approach taken by the movie version. (John Cook as the Headmaster of this particular enterprise is hilarious.) All the big production scenes-notably "Cornet Man" -benefit from the same approach. But imagine these guys dancing away at Fanny's mother's saloon on Henry Street. Posture?! They all look like they're going to fall over backwards. Not one of them knows a Bar Mitzvah from a bagel.

Of course the production also lacks a Streisand. But Linda Spohn is good, and got better as the evening progressed. She doesn't try to make you forget Barbra; instead, she honors her memory. And it's interesting to hear at last some of the notes Streisand extrapolated from.

Darcy Pulliam as Mrs. Brice and Kevin Cotter as Fanny's toe-tapping friend Eddie Ryan are delightful in two minor numbers, "Who Taught Her Everything," and "Find Yourself a Man," Cotter has the best voice in the cast. My favorite character has always been the neighborhood yenta Mrs. Strakosh, Eva Piques, who inherited this gem, has read either not enough or too much Philip Roth. She swallowed some of her best lines (especially "When a girl's incidentals are no bigger than two lentils, then to me that doesn't spell success."). For this I waited all day in anticipation?!

PRACTICALLY everything else is quite good. The chorus sings out loud and clear. Barry Harman's choreography and direction are serviceable and sometimes imaginative, and the whole cast seems well-rehearsed-whatever they're doing, it's what they planned to do. While I don't feel overly competent commenting in these areas, I feel secure in reporting that the tickets are magnificent. They are printed by a computer and tell you everything about your seat except who sat in it last night. (This was opening night, maybe now they've got that too.) The box office director said they're cheaper than regular tickets. I guess that's how they got the money for all those sequined mirrors. The publicity poster is also clever: it shows the Queen of Hearts no less, with a tear running down her high cheekbone. Hmmmm.

The play itself is pleasant, but nothing to write home to Grosse Pointe about. It's got all the constituent parts-hopeless love, show biz, comic relief-but as Eddie tells Fanny in the first act: "Everything you've got's about right, but the damn thing don't come out right." Jule Styne and Bob Merrill's songs, on the other hand, are wonderful, from chorus songs like "Henry Street" to the torchy imitation of "My Man," "The Music that Makes Me Dance."

The only aspect of the production which leaves me puzzled is a not inserted into the program referring to some vague "invaluable assistance" provided by one Sara Linnie Slocum Brownell. I don't know what she did, but she probably did it well, and she certainly fit in.