`Sunday in the Park’ an artistic musical > Production mirrors the world of Seurat

Georges Seurat, the French painter, was a fool for color. Break it down scientifically into dots of paint, he said, and the eye will put it together again magically. “Sunday in the Park with George,” the Stephen Sondheim-James Lapine musical now being performed by Penobscot Theatre at the Opera House, works on the same level. We look through the eyes of Seurat — at the way he breaks down the world around him — and see how he arranges it all in harmony in the monumental painting “Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte.”

One of the lyrics of “Sunday in the Park” is “art isn’t easy.” Neither is a Sondheim musical. This one is particularly snaggly because the music can sound disjointed, and the scenes sometimes unfold in a seeming dreamlike pattern. It’s based loosely on Seurat’s life but actually is about some of the larger questions regarding art, the artist, the art critic and the art patron.

The show takes place in two time periods and countries. Act I introduces Seurat (who lived from 1859 to 1891), his lover, his mother and his community of friends in France. Act II whisks forward to a cocktail party in contemporary New York, where Seurat’s fictional great-grandson is giving a presentation on his own conceptual art pieces.

Fifteen years ago, when “Sunday in the Park” appeared on Broadway, it was almost as controversial in its form as Seurat’s pointillism in the 19th century. But like Seurat’s paintings, “Sunday in the Park” makes connections, and the Penobscot Theatre production, directed by Mark Torres, shows why.

And “show” is literally the right word because the music-box set, designed by guest artist Lynn Porter, pays rich homage to Seurat’s elegance. Painted panels form a dioramalike display in which the actors re-create the scene Seurat immortalized at La Grande Jatte. The actors and small orchestra, conducted without timidity by music director Ludlow Hallman, pump this high-pitched moment full of drama, and it must be one of the most stunning Act I finales staged at the Opera House in a long time.

Victorian costumes by designer Ginger Phelps have complete consonance with the set, and Lynne Chase’s lights recapitulate pointillism with splatters of spots.

Although the orchestra is entirely too loud and often overpowers even the strongest of singers, the pacing of the music is lively. Even when the musicians or singers bumble, as they do on occasion, this production rarely falls short of being big and bold and interesting.

The community cast is uniformly pert, with notable ensemble tightness. Francis John Vogt’s Seurat is charming, if not a bit too tender and pleasant in places. But that’s nothing compared to the ridiculous fake beard he has been saddled with in Act I.

Elena DeSiervo is audacious as Dot, Seurat’s lover, and commands attention with her performance. Everyone in this cast makes a jumbo contribution to the overall work, but Elizabeth Moulton (Seurat’s mother), Margo Lukens (her nurse), Greg Hall (the boatman) and Monique Gibouleau (Elaine) are particularly bright.

“Sunday in the Park” won’t appeal to everyone. It’s split in its focus — part biography, part dilettantism. And it’s three hours long. But it can be provocative, and Penobscot Theatre presents an intimate and vivid music-box view of an artist putting it together — bit by bit.

Penobscot Theatre will present “Sunday in the Park with George” 7 p.m. Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday, 8:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, through May 2, at the Opera House on Main Street in Bangor. For tickets, call 942-3333.