At: Boxer Rebellion Theater,

1257 W. Loyola

Phone: (773) 465-7325: $15

Runs through: Dec. 20

Squeeze in four musicians, a shooting gallery, a gallows and a wheel of fortune, and there isn't much room for anything else in a typical storefront theatre. Recognizing the limitations, director Michael Pieper has kept Assassins relatively simple with few attempts at choreography or elaborate movement, letting the show speak and sing for itself. One result is that this second collaboration (after Pacific Overtures and long before the current Bounce) between Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman seems more a cantata—a thematic song cycle—than a musical.

This 85-minute one-act, about nine men and women who attempted to murder American presidents, opened Off-Broadway in December 1990 and ran only 73 performances. If you've forgotten, four assassins succeeded, killing Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley and Kennedy. The dark characters and subject matter made Assassins both controversial and a curiosity. John Weidman's book attempts to pull together the assortment of historic footnotes in this fairly exclusive club, but they have little in common save relative youth (five were in their 20s, the oldest was 45). With a lot of wannabe White House murderers not included in the show, one wonders why the authors picked the obscure Samuel Byck.

Set at a carnival, the premise is that all the assassins saw killing a president as a key to fulfillment. The opening number says 'Everybody's got the right to be happy/No one can be put in jail for their dreams.' But it doesn't quite work: several were just plumb crazy, while at least one—Booth—had no illusions about personal happiness. The climactic book scene—in which Booth and the others justify their own lives by persuading Lee Harvey Oswald to shoot JFK—is forced and false. Weidman's dialog references Arthur Miller, firebrand socialist Emma Goldman and Leonard Bernstein, but is at its best in two extremely funny scenes between Lynette 'Squeaky' Fromme and Sara Jane Moore, who independently took shots at Gerald Ford in 1975.

Despite flaws, Assassins is Sondheim's most all-American score; a musical pastiche paying homage to Sousa, Gottschalk, gospel, folk ballad and Hail to the Chief. The opening number, the 'Ballad for Booth' that follows, and the wildly theatrical 'Ballad of Guiteau' that features a cakewalk to the gallows, are among Sondheim's highlights. Under musical director Ethan Deppe, the cast of 16 nails Sondheim's tricky rhythms and most—not quite all—of his tight harmonic modulations, as several singers seem to be working outside their strongest ranges.

Within a capable ensemble Jenny Lamb and (especially) Angela Bullard are a stitch as Fromme and Moore; cute red-head Steve Tomlitz is sweet voiced as the Balladeer narrator; Christopher Prentice and Shannon E. Farmer bring strong presence to Booth and Guitteau. Some moments were too big for the premises on opening night; Pieper should pull them back. ----------------------------------------