Aside from a few ragged spots, the small orchestra (four strings, three woodwinds, three brass, percussion and harp) provided good support under the leadership of Peter Larson, who took his degree in music from Harvard in 1968. The orchestra would have profited from a few more string players, but the need to economize probably dictated otherwise.

Reportedly the title role was not in the best hands in Connecticut, and the part has been taken over here by Susan Watson, who turns out to have been a wise choice. I never saw any performance by the legendary Helen Morgan, for whom the part was tailored, but she must have had some kind of talent to have inspired such widespread adulation. I am, however, familiar with Morgan's singing, which I have always thought much overrated: her voice had a rapid, almost bleating tremolo, which I found unattractive.

I feel quite confident in stating that Susan Watson's Adeline is far superior to Helen Morgan's. Watson has an exquisite lyric soprano voice without the thinness that one often finds. Her pitch is secure, and her diction clear. Like many singers, she has a tendency not to hold the last notes of phrases to their full value, but hers is lovely vocalism all the same. And she is no stranger to the style of the 1920's, since she created the title role in the 1971 Broadway revival of No. No. Nanette.

In Sweet Adeline, Watson admirably conveys the warmth, the yearning, and the vulnerability appropriate to her character. And there are entrusted to her a sheaf of appealing songs: "Here Am I," "Out of the Blue," "Don't Ever Leave Me," "The Sun About to Rise," and--the finest gem of the score--"Why Was I Born?"

Travis Hudson makes the most of Lulu, a veteran vaudevillian of hearty humor, whom she turns into an amusing cross between Mae West and Patsy Kelly. She has fun with the low range of "My Husband's First Wife," and the perky syncopations of "Naughty Boy." She and Jay Garner (as Lulu's flashily dressed husband and partner), aided by a pair of tambourines, go to town on "I'd Leave My Happy Home For You," another older piece that Kern interpolated in this show. As their mousy but well-to-do cousin Rupert, John Remme is especially comical when he says, "I've been thinking of you morning, noon, and night," ticking off on three fingers the times of day.

Candy Darling is attractive as Addie's sister Nellie (why has her name here been changed to Jennie, and their father's from Emil to Otto?), and Deborah Rush makes Dot into a squeaky-voiced ninny. Robert Sevra's singing voice is a bit too strained for the fickle-hearted Tom. As up-and-coming composer Sid, Doyle Newberry is fittingly earnest, but (like most real composers) he isn't much of a singer. Russ Beasley is stiff as Sam Herzig, a producer, but he looks like any producer's dream of a handsome, mustachioed matinee idol. And Carl Nicholas brings a welcome touch of the old country to the German-born beer-garden owner.

One person who seems not to have been subject to budgetary restraint is David Toser, the costume designer, whose work for this production is absolutely dazzling. A number of people in the cast who could have gotten by with only a couple of outfits are lucky enough to go through a seemingly inexhaustible wardrobe of lavish garb.

If you can disregard the tenuous and naive excuse for a plotline on which Sweet Adeline is hung, you should find this revival rewarding to look at and listen to; and you will find out what sort of escapist entertainment appealed to your parents or grandparents.

[The production continues at Brandeis University's Spingold Theatre in Waltham through July 17, to be followed by Shaw's "Too True to Be Good." July 19 to August 14; Vincent Youman's "Hit the Deck," August 16 to 21; and a new musical by Clark Gesner, "The Utter Glory of Morrissey Hall," August 23 through September 11.]