ANGELS SEEKING WINGS AND DRAMATIC CREDIBILITY.

Byline: EVAN HENERSON

>THEATER CRITIC

Choral composer Eric Whitacre may be among the next exciting musical theater voices. So, at least, say the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and the American Academy of Arts and Letters, both of which have showered laurels on Whitacre's long-gestating debut musical, "Paradise Lost: Shadows and Wings."

On the score of "Paradise Lost," that is. Nobody appears to have honored the musical's book, and after seeing the show's arresting world premiere at the Theater@Boston Court, perhaps the less we say about Whitacre's storytelling ability (he's the book writer as well as the co-lyricist), the better.

This production -- a technological and multigenre fusion more operatic than straight-on musical -- is as heavy on performance talent as it is chockablock with visual bells and whistles usually reserved for larger arenas. Credit director Michael Michetti, the Boston Court and underwriting angel Peter Schneider for delivering something rather grand and frequently astonishing.

But when not gaping, you may giggle. And the deathly in earnest "Paradise Lost" is not for built for laughs.

There may be a dignified way of recounting a story of adult children of angels searching for their missing wings and the accompanying liberation it will signal, but this isn't it.

There's this colony of wingless -- and therefore powerless -- seraphim guarded over by protection-minded leader Logos (played by Dan Callaway). Many years before, the angels' elders, in the face of unspecified peril from the outside world, stripped their children of wings, promising eventually to return and take the kids home.

Seventeen years have passed, with Logos leading the colony -- akin to a prison compound -- in battle exercises. His kid sister Exstasis (Hila Plitmann), ostensibly the angels' savior, is less inclined to wait much longer.

Rounding out the ensemble are Gravitas (Rodolfo Nieto), a simpleton with a knack for thievery; Fervio (Daniel Tatar), who runs a gambling ring; Pieta (Juli Robbins), who makes the fake wings for the battle exercises; and Aia (Marie M. Wallace), beloved by Gravitas. "Paradise's" ostensible villain is Logos' lieutenant, Ignis, (Kevin Odekirk), mistakenly trained by Logos to opt for force over intellect.

"There is another way," Exstasis repeats in what appears to be the show's mantra, and she's going to find it. This "other way" involves a hidden key, an underground cavern and a silver box that, when opened, releases a mass of shimmering silver butterflies (maneuvered on poles by the ensemble).

Given the mass of energy, skill and visual dazzle that have gone into this, you want so desperately to buy into Exstasis and the angel's quest. But too often, extreme hokiness is an enemy more powerful than even a battle-tested angel can combat.

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PARADISE LOST: SHADOWS AND WINGS - Two and one half stars

>Where: Theatre@Boston Court, 70 N. Mentor Ave., Pasadena.

>When: 8 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday; through Sept. 2.

>How much: $34. [phone], www.bostoncourt.com.

>In a nutshell: Visually cool but dramatically corny.

CAPTION(S):

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Photo:

Dan Callaway, left, and Kevin Odekirk are wingless angels in search of what they're missing in "Paradise Lost."