In all of Peter Arno's roughshod rides over the horsey set, the classic caricature never dared approach "Park Avenue" in naked triteness. Twenty years late, playwright George Kaufman and composer Arthur Schwartz are endeavoring to sell the public a brand of musical comedy that has long been by the way, and that must be hyper-professional to satisfy.

"Park Avenue" concerns itself with top-drawer sassiety and the casual interpretation of the marriage knot which has long been characteristic of stage aristocrats. Through two overdrawn acts, Mrs. Sybil Bennet of Oyster Bay joins a covey of her lady friends in pulling off matrimonial deals and counter-deals fairly devastating in their nonchalance.

Back in the roaring pre-depression years, Arthur Schwartz produced "Dancing in the Dark" and later memorable scores for "Revenge With Music" and "At Home Abroad." Kaufman has hit pay-dirt consistently through two decades of the American tunitee;" and Leonora Corbett, the other-worldly bank on the smartness, sophistication, or schmaltz of another day, differently tempered--or perhaps the Messrs. Kaufman and Schwartz are, plainly and bluntly, "written out." Whatever the explanation, "Park Avenue" has tunes and situations that smack far too conspicuously of past playgoing.

Flashes of hilarious dialogue are more than occasional; partly, we may imagine, a consequence of collaborator Nunnally Johnson's hand in the scripting. Ira Gershwin's customarily witty lyrics fare well under the care of Arthur Margetson, recently of "Around the World," who sings "Land of Opportunitee;" and Leonora Corbett, the other-worldly wife in Broadway's original "Blithe Spirit," who solidly sends "The Dew is on the Rose" (pro-early divorce: "before they ever rifted, they drifted--apart"), and the show's best song, "My Son-in-Law."

Raymond Walburn and Mary Wickes, moviedom Sad Sacks, in company with Jed Prouty and Robert Chisholm, turn in top character jobs all good for the expectable number of laughs. "Don't Be a Woman if You Can" is first-rate patter and "There's No Holding Me" likeable ballad. But there's no getting around something stale--you've heard it before, you've seen it before, and it isn't good enough this time to make you think you haven't.