'Suburban Love Songs' grooves to '60s

You are cordially, more or less, invited to a night of cocktailing. Wear your calf-high boots. Polish your peace symbol. Prepare to blow your mind.

The delightful, quirky

Suburban Love Songs -

dance-theater that speaks volumes without a word of dialogue - equally celebrates and lacerates late-'60s social grace.

The hour-long piece bubbled up in the vision of choreographer Karen Getz, who also directed and dances in it.

Suburban Love Songs

was a hit at the Philly Fringe/Live-Arts Festival two seasons back and is bound for glory in its first regular-season revival, by 1812 Productions.

The show's now tighter, with more brio in its characters; Jennifer Childs, artistic director of comedy-centered 1812 Productions, remains in her role as hostess of

Suburban Love Songs'

groovy

proceedings,

and her character's

especially pumped - a little unsure, a lot uptight, but always in control.

Except for new cast member Amy Smith, codirector of Headlong Dance Theater, the troupe is the original. Smith and Getz are the only people on stage who make their livings largely in dance. The others six dancers are primarily actors, and all eight know how to accent the comedy through dancing.

Getz's choreography is ripe with shtick, communicating through kinetic punch lines aimed at all things '60s: getting stoned, managing the munchies, passing the Tupperware, mastering the stupid game of Twister. The dancing is fine, and if some of it seems rough around the edges, that's one of the points - so were the '60s, for sure.

This party's dressed for attitude in Charlotte Cloe Fox Wind's costumes - a parade of man-made fibers that would complement any Barcalounger - and staged on Bradley Helm's primary-color set with Stephen Keever's cool lighting. The musical accompaniment - think "Classical Gas" and Herb Alpert and "Season of the Witch" - will drop you into the '60s, whether you lived them or not.

The cast's three guys - Fred Siegel, Dave Jadico and Mario Fabroni - rage with testosterone when Jadico shows off his latest wow-wow acquisition: the hi-fi stereo. They are matadors taming the electronic bull. The women - Dawn Falato and Mary Carpenter join Getz, Childs and Smith - are caught up in a tail-chase that pairs them with one another's mates and, at times, one another.

If you're a certain age, you'll cringe a little, even as you laugh. If you only heard about '60s style,

Suburban Love Songs

will exuberantly confirm all your suspicions. "Well," sings the recorded chanteuse, as the cast socks it to you, "I think I'm going out of my head." We certainly hope so.

Presented by 1812 Productions

at Plays & Players Theatre, 1714 Delancey St., through April 27. Tickets: $15 to $25. Information: 215-592-9560 or

» READ MORE: www.1812productions.org

.