PASSION IGNITES THE DANCES IN REVISED `FOREVER TANGO'.

Byline: Donna Perlmutter Special to the Daily News

Can a stage show, with all the trappings of a dark, smoky cabaret, actually give off that aura? Can it be the real thing while masquerading as a theatrical production?

You bet - if we're talking about ``Forever Tango,'' which returned Wednesday to Los Angeles after a two-year absence, this time to the Pasadena Civic Auditorium.

For the dancers and musicians bring the atmosphere with them - all the way from Argentina, of course. No, take that back. They are the atmosphere, which exudes the art of Eros, the culture of compelling closeness, the gritty intertwining of spirits.

Born in the Buenos Aires bordellos and exported to Parisian high society, the tango - in this authentic, timeless form - is the dance and music of dangerously intense couplings and thrilling denouements. It's a montage that touches off our notions of what deep intimacy is all about.

This time around, the format has tightened and some of the music has changed - although Astor Piazzolla's and Lisandro Adrover's big numbers are still there, delivering their fierce rhythms with plangent, heart-stopping accents by way of bandoneons and violins; their jazz melancholy, thanks to pianist Fernando Marzan.

But the cast of dancers has largely changed. Yes, even the new couples are superbly individual. There's Claudia and Luis - she accepts his chauvinist swipes at her, but they are so integrated into the virtuosic dances that we feel only wonderment, not offense, at seeing them. There's Guillermia and Roberto, whose smoothness in high-velocity dancing can take your breath away. And Guillermo and Cecilia, she with the shapely long legs, also do dazzling things.

They all still have a certain look - ranging from those with pomaded coifs to flying silken locks - as they bound or slither across the stage in their hunkered-down, close-together love skirmishes, amid a frenzy of intricately coordinated high-speed kicks. And they still have the power to turn casual onlookers into mesmerized voyeurs.

What these virtuosos do is unlike anything in the genre of social or ballroom dancing. In fact, some of it makes Fred and Ginger's routines look easy. Take, for example, the double-tempo swivel turns negotiated with furiously fast intricate kicks between partners facing each other - a hazard course for broken shins.

But Gloria and Eduardo are sorely missed. In their place as an older, portly pair, Mayoral and Elsa Maria play to the audience rather than engage each other. (He does, at any rate, while she just looks clumsy.)

Still, the question is not whether to see this show but how many times to make the drive to Pasadena.

THE FACTS The show: ``Forever Tango.''

Where: Pasadena Civic Auditorium, 300 E. Green St., Pasadena.

When: 5 and 8:30 p.m. today and Saturday, 3 and 7 p.m. Sunday.

Tickets: $19 to $45. Call Ticketmaster, [phone].