Broadway talent has been lured to the Richard Brinsley Sheridan-inspired show, produced by Scandal Productions. The pop-jazz musical comedy with book and lyrics by Charles Leipart and music by Eric Schorr has a company that includes D'Monroe (Rent, Jesus Christ Superstar, Saturday Night Fever), Shani Lynn Nielsen (Jekyll and Hyde), Richard Vida (Les Misérables, 42nd Street), Valerie Wright (Annie Get Your Gun, Damn Yankees, Steel Pier), Erick Devine (Ragtime, Seussical), Nadiyah S. Dorsey (Constant Star, regionally), Kristi Tomooka (Miss Saigon) and Todd Lawson (Unnatural Acts, Summer and Smoke, regionally).

  Choreography is by Josh Walden, musical direction is by John Fischer and direction by Marcia Milgrom Dodge.

"It's Richard Sheridan's classic comedy of manners School for Scandal set in Tribeca," says librettist lyricist Leipart, in production notes. "In between jolts of lattes and espressos the downtown jitterati scramble for sex, love and mega-bucks in this cyberized post-modem musical comedy with mismatched lovers and on-line trashers.  E-mail flies as two brothers, gallery owner and rocker C.Z. and glib banker Joe, vie for the affections of Mirielle, the hot-young fashion designer, while Susie the scandal-loving owner of downtown's hippest coffee bar — Espresso Trasho — plots to win back her stud muffin, C.Z....

"Flying high on caffeine among these jitterati is Johnnie Rep, the gender-bending performance artist.  Which brother will win the big money and the hot young Mirielle?  Will the scandal-queen's vicious villainies succeed?  Espresso Trasho is a cell phone to the heart and a bolt of comedic musical caffeine."

Designers are Joanne Haas (costumes), Ken Lapham (lighting). The works of Leipart and Schorr have been performed by Rebecca Luker, Alison Fraser, Matt Bogart, Marin Mazzie, Michael Winther, Sally Mayes, Greg Jbara, Marla Schaffel, and Tamara Tunie, among others.

Leipart is a recent winner of the Edward Kleban Award, is the author and lyricist of Thorstein Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class, The Showgirl of 72nd Street and (with music by Eric Schorr) The Doctor's Wife (a musical version of Flaubert's "Madame Bovary") and The Frog Prince.  Besides his work with Leipart, Schorr contributed songs to Howard Crabtree's Whoop Dee Do!, and wrote the music and lyrics for Young Tom Edison.

  Tickets are $15. Fringe shows are presented on scattered days and times. The Linhart Theatre is at 440 Lafayette Street, third floor (across from the Public Theater), Lafayette Street and Astor Place. Tickets are $15.  For information call (212) 279-4488 or visit www.FringeNYC.org.