Barely somber ‘Mary Poppins’ settles in at SF Playhouse

El Beh is a confident and charismatic title character in “Mary Poppins” at the SF Playhouse.

Everyone knows it's a fun holiday with Mary Poppins. However, the stage version at the San Francisco Playhouse over the holidays may be a little less cheerful than most people remember.

Featuring a book by “Downton Abbey” creator Julian Fellowes, the 2004 musical, which has been making the rounds among Bay Area theater companies in recent years, is a strange combination of the popular 1964 Disney film and the books by PL Travers. Some of the adventures from the film were cut and replaced with incidents and dialogue from the first three Mary Poppins books.

These new additions include the immortal candy store owner Mrs. Corry (the cheerful Sophia LaPaglia), a dancing statue (Dominic Dagdagan), the incompetent servant Robertson Ay (Rod Voltaire Edora, reprising his role from the Woodminster Summer Musicals production) and the fearsome Father George Banks' childhood nanny, played with joyous villainy by Katrina Lauren McGraw.

The film's focus on George's transformation is not only retained in the musical, but even expanded upon, although all of the parental songs have been replaced by new, significantly less catchy songs.

Ryan Drummond is a stern and ponderous Mr. Banks who really makes you feel sorry for his neglected, sweet but wayward children, Jane (sixth grader Ruth Keith, alternating with 13 year old Grace Hutton) and Michael (eighth grader David Rukin). shares the role with 11-year-old Billy Hutton). Abby Haug plays the children's disappointed mother, Winifred Banks, stoically and reserved. (Haug and Drummond played a similar couple in SF Playhouse's “Sunday in the Park with George” this summer.)

The stage musical cuts about a third of Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman's wonderful songs from the film, retaining arguably the most memorable pieces, although the others are certainly missing. They're replaced by generally duller songs by composer George Stiles and lyricist Anthony Drewe (the team behind nearly a dozen musicals like “Honk!” and “Betty Blue Eyes”).

The previously unknown orchestra, led by Katie Coleman, does excellent work with new and old numbers, and even the new ditties have some highlights, such as Mary's “Practically Perfect” and “Brimstone and Treacle,” Miss Andrew's sadistic response to “A Spoonful of”. Sugar.”

Chimney sweep and jack-of-all-trades Bert acts as an ever-present observer and provides the musical narration to the tune of a strangely dark version of “Chim Chim Cher-ee.” Wiley Naman Strasser in the SF Playhouse production is the first Bert I've seen who really makes this melancholic version of Bert work, playing the role with empathetic intensity, like someone who sees the pain of the world and himself longs to make things better.

The great cast of the main roles is what really makes the production by company co-founder and production manager Susi Damilano shine. El Beh plays Mary Poppins with a confident and unwavering certainty and a slightly sardonic manner that is terribly charismatic.

The role is deliberately less conventionally feminine than usual in this production, so Behs Mary sings in a slightly lower vocal range and lifts Bert in dances as often as Bert lifts her. Most of it works perfectly, although the strange outfit of pants, bow tie and fancy jacket that costume designer Abra Berman gives the normally immaculate Mary in the second act makes it seem like she's going to a prom.

Supported by cloudy sky projections by Theodore JH Hulsker, Nina Ball's imaginative rotating set of a forest of rooftop chimneys unfolds to reveal various locations around the home and neighborhood. It also leaves little room for Kimberly Richards' choreography, which ends up being rather lackluster, although at times amusingly modern.

Set just as Disney is about to release its own film sequel (“Mary Poppins Returns” in late December), the musical offers a strangely dark but ultimately heartwarming return to Cherry Tree Lane.

Contact Sam Hurwitt at shurwitt@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter.com/shurwitt.

'MARY POPPINS'

By Julian Fellowes, George Stiles, Anthony Drewe, Richard B. Sherman and Roger B. Sherman, based on the novels by PL Travers and the Disney film, presented by the San Francisco Playhouse

Through: January 12th

Where: San Francisco Playhouse, 450 Post St., San Francisco

Duration: Two hours and 50 minutes, one break

Tickets: $35-$125; 415-677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org