For a show that won six Tony Awards when it premiered on Broadway in 2005, "The Light in the Piazza" didn't make much of an impression on San Diego the first time around. Rather, it wasn't given the opportunity to make an impression on local audiences. The Nederlander Organization and Broadway San Diego elected not to bring the musical's 2006-07 national tour to the Civic Theatre, citing the highbrow musical's lack of commercial appeal. Perhaps, though that didn't stop similar tour presenters in Los Angeles and Orange County from booking the show. In the worst blow to our civic pride, after its two Southern California stops, the tour packed up and headed to that storied bastion of high culture: Mesa, Arizona.

It seems fitting, then, that Coronado's Lamb's Players Theatre finally present the regional premiere of Craig Lucas and Adam Guettel's romantic musical. Though not always doing full justice to Mr. Guettel's (grandson of legendary Broadway tunesmith Richard Rodgers) lush score, director Robert Smyth's production finds its strengths, chiefly in Deborah Gilmour Smyth's leading performance as an American matron abroad in post-war Italy.

Chanlon Jay Kaufman, Deborah Gilmour Smyth and Season Duffy

Copyright©2008 Nathan Peirson

Based on Elizabeth Spencer's 1960 novella, "The Light in the Piazza" follows the mother, Margaret Johnson, on her vacation through Florence and Rome with her adult daughter, Clara, who as a young girl was kicked in the head by a pony. The accident has left 26-year-old Clara with the developmental abilities of a child, and complications ensue with the chance meeting of Fabrizio Naccarelli, a local ragazzo. Though neither of the pair speak more than a word or two of the other's language, each is smitten in a way that transcends words, allowing Mr. Guettel's soaring score to take over.

Unfortunately, it's the score that suffers the most in Mr. Smyth's staging. That's no slight to musical directors G. Scott Lacy and Charlie Reuter, nor to conductor Reuter's eight-piece onstage orchestra. Once we get the past the sweeping overture, in which the orchestra's small size is most readily apparent without the additional layering of voices on top, it's smooth sailing for Mr. Reuter and his musicians. Those voices, though, seem to be the primary problem here. Perhaps the best thing that can be said for one among them is that she hits the right notes. But hitting the right notes should be the least of the singers' worries in a musical score as moving and challenging as this.

Ms. Smith manages the complex melodies and phrasing best, painting an exquisite portrait of a mother in an extraordinarily sensitive situation. She's powerful on the expansive, 11-o'clock "Fable," and displays a thoughtfulness that pervades the delicate melancholy of "Dividing Day."

Chanlon Jay Kaufman similarly has the technical skill and lovestruck passion to give wing to his most demanding aria, "Il Mondo Era Vuoto" (sung completely in Italian). Mr. Kaufman's soaring notes and despairing urgency belong specifically to that class of youths who are either European or in love -- and preferably both. If his Italian isn't always letter-perfect, it's inordinately more accurate than some of the others portraying members of the Naccarelli clan. At times Signor Naccarelli (Stephen Godwin), in particular, sounds just like a native of Florence -- Florence, Alabama, that is.

Sandy Campbell (Signora Naccarelli) and Family

Copyright©2008 Nathan Peirson

One of the few Lamb's newcomers to the cast, it's Jersey boy Spencer Rowe who nails his small role -- and the Italian -- as Fabrizio's swaggering brother Giuseppe. In Jeanne Reith's sculpted postwar Sophia Loren dresses, fellow Lamb's first-timer Teressa Byrne also has that air of Italian authenticity as sister-in-law Franca, even if her piercing high notes are less than pleasurable.

In the central role of Clara, Lamb's regular Season Duffy is the most uncomfortable fit seen in a while. It's not her maturity, though, that's most grating; in Nathan Peirson's shadowy cathedral lighting, even in his golden tones for the open-air piazza, Ms. Duffy as a 26-year-old does not stretch the limits of believability. But during the course of the evening, the various registers of her voice seem to be coming from three different people. There's the throaty alto that she's displayed to great effect in other shows, which here makes a brief appearance in Act Two, a hollow soprano with pinched top notes, and an unsteady mezzo wedged uncomfortably between the two. Any way one looks at it, it's not the voice that a golden-throated Florentine with limited English skills would be very likely to fall hopelessly in love with.

Chanlon Jay Kaufman and Season Duffy

Copyright©2008 Nathan Peirson

One can wonder about their chance encounter, too, in Mr. Smyth's puzzling staging of the opening scene. As staged by Mr. Smyth, Mr. Kaufman's Fabrizio doesn't seem to be casually strolling about Mike Buckley's columned piazza set when a sudden wind blows Clara's hat into his hands; the way Mr. Kaufman clandestinely appears from behind a black curtain, immediately eyeing Ms. Duffy with a mischievous twinkle of the eye, there's something almost stalkerish about the whole thing.

Ah well. I suppose any staging of "The Light in the Piazza" is better than none at all. Next time, though, Lamb's might want to look a little further outside of its regular casting pool to ensure a more fully realized production of this challenging work.