A MEL OF A SHOW.

Byline: Evan Henerson Theater Critic

'WALK THIS WAY,'' says swishy director's assistant Carmen Ghia before shimmying stage left in a motion that is half canter, half epileptic seizure. And if you can't see what's coming next, then you've obviously never before heard the name Mel Brooks.

Walk this way? Got it. A shrugging Max Bialystock tries his level best to parrot Carmen Ghia's distinctive walk, looking a bit like Richard III in the process. Leo Bloom, however, breaks into a hula swivel that bears a distinctive resemblance to the movement of Ed Grimley. Which is fitting, since Leo is played by Grimley creator Martin Short. So that's potentially two laughs from the same joke - both pirated. Mel Brooks is stealing from his own ``Young Frankenstein'' joke, and Short is borrowing from his own sketch character. Are the yuks forthcoming? Was Marty Feldman bug-eyed?

``The Producers'' is that kind of a show: a brash behemoth with a ``You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet'' sensibility that assumes that anything - and I do mean anything - is fair game for a gag. Cinematically speaking, it's been a while since Brooks demonstrated that he still knows something about being funny. This musical, among the biggest hits in Broadway history, assumes that you found the humor of ``walk this way'' funny 30 years ago and can still laugh at it today. ``The Producers'' may be a lot of things - most of them a hell of a lot of fun - but it takes some serious temerity to label this package ``the new Mel Brooks musical.'' The only thing new is the wrapping paper.

And, at L.A.'s Pantages Theatre, the marquee names. Not having seen the Broadway production, I don't know how Jason Alexander (of ``Seinfeld'' fame) and Martin Short (SCTV, ``Saturday Night Live'') match up to the work of original performers Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick. But the two L.A. stars, who will be with the show for its entire eight-month run, are a splendidly hammy duo. They'll do this material proud. Heaven knows they'll sell tickets.

Generally sticking to the plot of Brooks' 1967 movie, ``The Producers'' follows the exploits in 1959 of schlock Broadway producer Bialystock (Alexander) and accountant Bloom as they look to produce a sure-fire flop and book it to Rio with the oversold invested profits. Along the way, they cross swords with a pigeon-breeding neo-Nazi playwright; a screamingly gay director with the worst possible taste in ... well, everything; a bunch of randy little old ladies who must be bilked out of their investment checks; and a sexpot of a Swedish office assistant with a comically imperfect command of the English language.

The - ahem! - musical that Bialy and Bloom are producing is titled ``Springtime for Hitler.'' Now, the first scene of ``Springtime for Hitler'' - with the accompanying audience reaction - is one of the great comic moments in film history. We see ``Springtime'' in the musical as well, although after a boat load of zany energy has been expended in other areas. Is the Fuhrer folly therefore anticlimactic? No, it is not.

Honestly, the plot serves to string together a bunch of over-the-top set pieces that director Susan Stroman and a cheerfully off-color design team milk for every ounce of laughter they can muster.

Where to even begin? With Bialystock being wheeled around in a trash can amid a chorus of derelicts? With playwright Franz Liebkind (Fred Applegate) and his insistence that Bialy and Bloom perform ``Der Guten Tag Hop Clop'' before signing over the rights to ``Springtime''? With the walker-tapping, free-swinging denizens of Little Old Lady Land? With Bloom and Swedish Ulla (Angie Schworer) in the randy duet ``That Face''?

You've got to wonder how Bialy, Bloom and that very versatile ensemble are able to build and sustain the energy that an ``I can top this'' beast like ``The Producers'' requires. Somehow, amid endless pratfalls and with sweat frequently pouring down their faces, Alexander and Short do. (A potentially alarming sign, however: Alexander seemed hoarse on opening night, and blustery Bialystock doesn't figure to get any easier as the months wear on).

Clearly as born to play Bialy as Lane was, Alexander is a master of the comic reaction. The actor makes the character careworn and cuddly. Short nails Bloom's histrionics and his obsessive tics; this is a character, remember, who whips out a baby-blue security blanket when things get stressful. Both performers - staying true to their roots in musical theater - handle the singing and dancing quite effectively.

Stroman has surrounded them with able supporting players. Schworer's Amazonian Ulla gets a laugh practically every time she opens her mouth (``Mr. Bleeeuum''). Gary Beach's Hitler-as-Streisand turn in the ``Springtime'' sequence ain't bad either.

Brooks and co-author Thomas Meehan have punched up the love story and tossed in a soppy 11th-hour anthem to friendship. You might contend that said additions help blunt the edge off what was once a keen satire. Then again, all traces of understatement have been pretty much obliterated by the time we encounter the swastika-wearing pigeon puppets.

So give the author credit. It's no mean feat to recycle your own film script into a stage smash. More than any show in recent memory, ``The Producers'' demonstrates that the words ``shameless'' and ``shameful'' carry the same meaning. It will also make you laugh. By any means necessary.

THE PRODUCERS - Three stars

Where: Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood.

When: 8 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sunday, some Thursday matinees; through Jan. 4, 2004.

Tickets: $25 to $95. Call [phone].

In a nutshell: As over-the-top as theater has ever been, and quite funny as well.

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Photo:

(1 -- 3) Jason Alexander, left, stars as Max Bialystock in ``The Producers,'' which begins an eight-month run this weekend at the Pantages. Martin Short, seen with Angie Schworer, below, and Alexander, below, plays mousy accountant Leo Bloom.