Side Show.

How's this for the plot of a Broadway show: First of all, it's about two women who are inseparable. As long as they stick to their own community of "freaks," they're fine, but when they go public they're subject to leering speculations about their sex life. And the very thought that they might want to get married arouses disbelieving chuckles and voyeuristic curiosity nationwide.

Sound like the story of Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche? Well, it's actually Side Show, the new musical about Siamese twins Daisy and Violet Hilton. But gay viewers may be quick to spot the connection.

Side Show is based on the true story from the 1920s and '30s of a pair of sisters from San Antonio, Tex., born connected at the hip. Discovered in a carnival sideshow by a vaudeville impresario, they develop a singing act that tours music halls and ultimately lands them in Hollywood, where they reach the height of their fame playing themselves in Tod Browning's oddball classic film Freaks.

At heart, though, composer Henry Krieger (best known for Dreamgirls) and lyricist-librettist Bill Russell (whose credits include Pageant and other off-Broadway gay musicals) are intent on crafting a lush, romantic show that expresses a nearly universal human fear: "I'm a freak, and no one will ever love me." And to lead audiences through that dark mythical territory, they translate the core gay experience of coming out into terms anyone can understand.

The first act ends with the twins (Alice Ripley and Emily Skinner, in gorgeously simple performances) singing a ballad that cuts to the heart of the show: "Who Will Love Me As I Am?" (Get ready to hear cabaret divas croon this for the next ten years.) In the second act the sisters conclude, in what's clearly the moral of the story, that "feeling love is normal. Hiding it is not." In the tradition of La Cage aux Folles and Victor/Victoria, Side Show strikes a gentle blow for sexual freedom.

A very, very gentle blow--after all, this is Broadway. Although the opening number adopts a pseudo-Brecht-Weill attitude, challenging the audience to "Come Look at the Freaks," in fact we're looking at the usual array of attractive Broadway chorus kids. The show's eagerness to emphasize what reg'lar folks the sideshow freaks are, how much they "want to be like everybody else," doesn't make the audience stretch very far. And in contrast to Krieger's soaring tunes (beautifully orchestrated by veteran Harold Wheeler), Russell's predictable rhymes and earthbound recitative have a blandly sincere, Up With People quality to them.

As a result, the show is less fun--less freaky--than you might imagine. Director and choreographer Robert Longbottom goes to town with two deliciously campy vaudeville numbers featuring the Hilton sisters as Egyptian mummies and Busby Berkeley-like songbirds. Otherwise, Longbottom's staging sticks to manipulating four sets of bleachers as if they were the lighting towers in Michael Bennett's legendary production of Dreamgirls. In fact, Broadway-musical trivia buffs can and will have a field day spotting the many echoes of Dreamgirls in Side Show.

The most original number in the show is the climactic "Tunnel of Love." Suspended in midair, framed by a pulsing heart of chaser lights, the twins and their respective suitors test the depths of their passion. One couple dries up, and the other practically burns to a crisp. It's a wonderfully theatrical moment--and a disturbing reminder of how quickly love can disrupt and transform our lives.