Big Bang, The

You're invited to a borrowed Manhattan apartment to a prospective backers' preview of the world's most expensive musical: a history of the universe. So get there early and up-front for the cheese and crackers. Soon all the food -- as well as utensils, lampshades, drapes, clock, dishes, plants, pillows, ottoman, chairs -- will become props and costumes for frantic Gary Marachek and smooth Wayne LeGette to act and sing out scenes from "The Big Bang" (in darkness) to a not too enlightened "Twentieth Century."

Silliest of the silly stuff include a scene in Eden where "Free Food and Frontal Nudity" bore Adam and Eve out of the Dark Ages into the Middle ones at the French nunnery of the Sisters of Sacre Bleu, with habits made from baseball caps.

"Cooking for Henry" -- the VIII --  proves "not a job, a career."  Pocohontas and Minne Ha Ha meet up over Manhattans at the Algonquin bar. Wayne twists a pillowcase over his head and accents his vowel endings as Columbus at the court of Isabella, lisping Queen of Spain. A drapery skirt over two umbrellas hooked into Gary's belt clothes him as Amber Lee in the Antebellum South. Perhaps the least madcap number is "Potato," sung by Irish Gary in 1830 in Ireland to the last of his crop.

You get a lot of bang in anticipation of the performers getting your buck. They deserve every penny of the price of admission. Debonair Michael Sebastian, making music onstage all the while, is also well worth your lending your ears to.