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There are more bad musicals in this year's New York International Fringe Festival than there are Lennons in Lennon -- e.g., The New Bohemia, Byzantium the Musical, and The Banger's Flopera. To our eyes, there are no great musicals in FringeNYC to fully balance those, but there are three pretty good ones.

You don't get more "high concept" than a musical based on the Oscar-winning film Silence of the Lambs, which is one reason why Silence! The Musical has been the talk of the Festival. It turns out to be a musical with a cast to die for and a book that has comic bite but a score that's murder. The songs, by Jon and Al Kaplan, are in outlandishly bad taste. We don't necessarily mind nasty lyrics, but they had better be clever and witty instead of existing strictly for their shock value, as they do here. Christopher Gattelli's direction and choreography follow the same road map: a high-energy mix of inventive staging and over-the-top tastelessness. His work elicits many laughs but it's in the service of some very ugly humor. Jenn Harris, who plays FBI agent Clarice Starling, nails the part with comic élan; for our money, she's this generation's Andrea Martin. As Hannibal Lecter, Paul Kandel follows in the footsteps of his cinematic predecessor, Anthony Hopkins, by using stillness to good comic effect. There are also strong performances by Stephen Bienskie as "Buffalo Bill," Deidre Goodwin as Ardelia Mapp, and Lisa Howard as both victim Catherine Martin and her mother.

Fleet Week: The Musical is very different from Silence! in that its strongest element is its score by Sean Williams, Jordana Williams, and Mac Rogers -- particularly, its sparkling lyrics. The show is loosely based on On the Town, but here the sailors who debark in New York are predominantly gay. Most of the actors are pretty good and Rob Maitner, who plays their chaplain, gives a standout musical comedy performance. The show's failing is its ridiculous book, written by the same threesome mentioned above. Of course, it's meant to be silly, but there are limits!

In contrast, Shakedown Street is a musical homage to film noir -- mosty notably, The Big Sleep -- that tells its purposefully convoluted story with a lot of style. The music, much of it taken from the catalogue of the rock group The Grateful Dead, is melodic and often irresistible; however, the songs neither reveal character nor move the plot along. Several of the performers are outstanding: Michael Hunsaker, as the detective hero, sings the hell out of his songs; Derek Hake just about steals the show as a wildly gay photographer; and Tara Taylor plays the loyal secretary with comic charm. Add strong ensemble work and tight direction by Jeff Griffin, and you have an unusually sophisticated Fringe offering.

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Swinging for the Fences

The higher-profile offerings at the Fringe tend to have hip titles and a self-aware sense of humor, probably because the youthful writers and a large percentage of their equally youthful audience are fueled by a driving sense of irony. But some young writers have more serious issues on their minds, such as our TheaterMania colleague Adam Klasfeld, the writer and director of Good Fences Make Good Neighbors. His intelligent and thoughtful play is a piercing allegory about the nature of "boundaries" as they relate to everything from war to literature, from marriage to friendship. Klasfeld tells his tale from the perspective of an "Arabian" writer who's convinced he's been shot by someone on the other side of a wall that he himself conjured out of thin air. The writer soon learns that there are boundaries he never considered.

On the other hand, Clarinda Karpov's Ankhst is a ponderous failure. To a certain extent, the ambition of the piece and the ancient Egyptian history it imparts are fascinating -- but when some bad actors hit the stage, Ankhst begins to seem like a hideous parody of Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy. Take our advice and stay away.

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Sweet Dreams

There is a scene between Nathan Lane and Marian Seldes late in Terrence McNally's Dedication or the Stuff of Dreams that captures with stunning economy and breathtaking honesty the tension between the absolute necessity of theater and its total irrelevance. The scene is such a high-wire act of brilliant showmanship that its very existence tips the scales in theater's favor. The production tips the scales in Primary Stages' favor, for this is a passionate work of art about people who commit themselves to the stage for the sheer love of their craft. Dedication is McNally's love letter to the theater, and it is gratefully received.

In a way, this is a heroic comedy. True, its central characters lead modest lives, running a children's theater in a small town; but if you look closely, you'll see their grandeur. In a work of maturity, grace, and insight, McNally embraces a sentimentality that is laced with hard truths. He can see all the ugliness of life, riddled with tragedy and pain, but he reaches out to the theater for hope.

Lane gives a vulnerable and touching performance that's also notable for his perfect comic timing. Seldes is ferocious, and the rest of the cast -- Alison Fraser, Michael Countryman, Miriam Shor, Darren Pettie, and R.E. Rodgers -- is stellar. Lane will leave the show on September 4 but the run has been extended through October 2. Please make a dedicated effort to catch it.

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[To contact the Siegels directly, e-mail them at siegels@theatermania.com.]