‘The King’ and Hayley Mills

Hayley Mills will forever occupy a spot in the hearts of baby boomers--but not as a singer.

While promoting the touring “The King and I,� now at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa, Mills has gamely acknowledged to interviewers that she’s no singer. But she suggests that in her starring role as Anna, she can interpret the songs well enough, as an actress, to compensate for this deficiency.

She can’t.

Anna’s most familiar musical numbers come in fairly rapid succession near the beginning of the show: “I Whistle a Happy Tune,� “Hello, Young Lovers,� “Getting to Know You.� If they’re not sung well, the show gets off on the wrong foot.

At Tuesday’s opening performance, “I Whistle a Happy Tune� was not a happy tune. The many wobbly notes in “Hello, Young Lovers� made it difficult to listen to the lyrics; we were preoccupied by Mills’ valiant struggle to get through the melody.

Her singing improved marginally after this disastrous beginning. Her solo “Shall I Tell You What I Think of You� is spoken more than sung and sounded fine. And yes, she handles the nonmusical scenes with crisp professionalism and occasionally with rambunctious physicality--but not with the kind of star magnetism that would make up for the musical lapses.

Mills played Anna in director Christopher Renshaw’s first version of this revival, in Australia. But when his production went to Broadway, Donna Murphy got the role (and won a Tony). She was followed by Faith Prince. Casting Mills for the U.S. tour may have been an act of loyalty on Renshaw’s part, but it doesn’t come off that way. Instead, it looks as if the producers’ calculations went something like this: The rubes won’t care if she can’t sing as long as they get to see the star of “The Parent Trap� in person.

The producers would surely deny that any such thoughts entered their heads, but in fact that kind of reasoning might be valid in some markets. Clearly Mills is more famous than Donna Murphy.

Still, Orange County and southern Los Angeles County is a market where Lee Meriwether did a much better Anna just two years ago (with the late Long Beach Civic Light Opera) and where many fairly well-known actress-singers live just a few miles away. Renshaw’s revival is scheduled to play the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood next May, and Mills’ contract is up in April. So there may still be a chance for Southern Californians to see this “King and I� with an “I� who can sing.

The King here--long-haired Vee Talmadge--can sing fairly well, even though his role isn’t as vocally demanding. Talmadge is a funny, vigorous king, as determined when arguing his points as he is when ruling by fiat. His relative youth (compared not only to 51-year-old Mills but also to some of his predecessors in the role) makes the king’s openness to some new ideas less surprising, but it makes his eventual demise more surprising, not to say far-fetched.

The other voices are trained and capable, though they might sound better in this context than they would if we weren’t comparing them to this Anna. There is no single knockout performance.

Brian Thomson’s design is lavish: artful eruptions of scarlet and gold and fog, an intricate web of ropes for the dock scenes, a panel that crosses the stage depicting a panoramic bird’s-eye view of an antique Thai city, presumably Bangkok. The lighting by Nigel Levings and (for the tour) Mike Baldassari is especially dramatic. Still, the entire spectacle seems a bit shrunken on this stage, with a large proscenium-within-the-proscenium cutting off a surprisingly large swath of the stage sides.

Lar Lubovitch added a couple of dance scenes to Jerome Robbins’ original choreography, one near the beginning (“Royal Dance Before the King�) and one near the end (“Procession of the White Elephant�), but neither of them is tied into the narrative nearly as well as Robbins’ grand “The Small House of Uncle Thomas,� which remains as irresistible as ever.

Hayley Mills: Anna Leonowens

Vee Talmadge: King of Siam

Mel Duane Gionson: Kralahome

Helen Yu: Lady Thiang

Luzviminda Lor: Tuptim

Timothy Ford Murphy: Lun Tha

Ian Stuart: Captain Orton/Sir Edward Ramsey

Ricky Ullman: Louis Leonowens

Andrew Guyvijitr: Prince Chulalongkorn

Firdous Bamji: Interpreter

Khamla Somphanh: Eliza

Mario Camacho: Simon of Legree

Youn Kim: Angel George

Jessica Bautista: Little Eva

Nandita Shenoy: Topsy

David Cho: Uncle Thomas

A Dodge Endemol Theatricals and Kennedy Center production. Music by Richard Rodgers. Book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. Choreographed by Jerome Robbins. Musical staging by Lar Lubovitch. Sets by Brian Thomson. Costumes by Roger Kirk. Lights by Nigel Levings and Mike Baldassari. Sound by Tony Meola and Lewis Mead. Hair by David H. Lawrence. Music direction by Kevin Farrell. Production stage manager John Gray.

BE THERE

“The King and I,� Orange County Performing Arts Center, Segerstrom Hall, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. Tuesday-Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 7:30 p.m.; Saturday, Sunday, 2 p.m. Ends Sunday. $21-$52.50. (714) 556-ARTS. At Pantages Theatre, Hollywood, May 19-31 (though not necessarily with Hayley Mills). Running time: 2 hours, 50 minutes.