FEW ACTS COULD successfully follow Sly Stallone's chugging three raw eggs with any aplomb. On a traditionally glitter-filled evening, the offstage drama threatened to overshadow the actual production at the Hasty Pudding.

But against formidable odds, the onstage show seemed not only to win the attention of the raucous and inebriated crowd, but actually to knock its socks off.

From the moment the curtain rose last night on the Theatricals's 138th annual production, "Between the Sheiks," the audience easily forgot the offstage drama surrounding their Man of the Year, and happily warmed to the hot desert sun of Solong, Abyssinia.

And as soon as the curtain lifts halfway to reveal three sequined bellies gyrating to an Arabian beat, we know we're not in Kansas anymore.

We soon discover, along with the two unemployed concubines who are more or less tourguides for the show, that this is no ordinary spot. It's a sandswept, burning wasteland, oozing with mysterious "black goop." Everyone's concerned only to avoid the heat, and our luckless heroines, Alma Lovin (Brian Kenet) and Gwen Myway (David Nacht) can't even sell their experienced bodies. It's "Just deserts...In the land that God forgot/It's too darn hot."

Well, Gwen and Alma find a taker--the overripe harem head, Celia Lips (Ty Christopher Warren), who's constantly looking for new blood with which to tempt the timid Sultan Battery the Ever-Ready (Jon Tolins), who's got, well, women problems.

Seems the situation in Solong is rather precarious, what with the Sultan fainting at the sight of women, and thus not likely to perpetuate his accidental reign, and his evil Grand Vizier Ahab Younow (Nicholas Weir) lusting for his position.

It takes more than a little coaxing to make the shy Sultan appear. He's a neurotic misanthrope after Woody Allen's heart. Even the Sultan's charmingly innocent daughter, Dahlia Prayer (Steve Lyne), is too frightening for him. The dippy Dahlia dances in with a string of cutout paper dolls, ecstatic at the sight of Alma and Gwen, whom she's already pegged as playmates. Maybe they can even talk about boys, whom she's never seen. "Do they really have horrible steel buzz-saw blades in their pants, like Daddy told me?" she asks.

Having decided to "make plans, brew the tea, buy pajamas with little feet" and "decorate the room--it'll be keen!" she skips blithely offstage, begging for the next line.

"WELLESLEY!" sneers the cast, taking care of the obligatory spear of nearby women's colleges and reminding us that this is, first and foremost, a Pudding show.

And Pudding shows would be nothing without punning and plotting. To the audience's delight, there's plenty of both for the better part of three hours as "Between the Sheiks" unfolds.

As Dahlia and the other women fail to rouse the faint-hearted Sultan, his situation looks grim. The evil Ahab Younow, backed by his maniacal mercenary Moslem bodyguard, Mecca Myday (Robert McManus), is poised for action. Mecca's not a bad ally to have: "I eat armies for breakfast. I drink blood. I snack on glands." (He's not about to ask any superiors if we can win next time.)

Ahab's chance comes in the unlikely meeting of medieval East and West, the cosmic collision of a band of luckless crusaders from oh-so-civilized Britain with the exotic chaos of Solong.

BACK IN the "civilized world," where women wear chastity belts and men rarely use the keys, this group of bored, adventure-seekers is getting ready for the big Game--well, actually for some bloodshed. Truth be told, the main force behind the crusade is the mercenary and bloodthirsty Countess Interruptus (Zak Klobucher), who reads Soldier of Fortune and has all the men cowering. The appearance of this motley band is one of the funniest scenes in the show. Dressed like red-white-and-black chess pieces, they march down the aisles singing

Domine est requiem