You may have heard that Hollywood star (and onetime London stage actress) Catherine Zeta-Jones is making her Broadway debut in A Little Night Music. Yet this revival of Stephen Sondheim's 1973 musical — imported from London's West End — marks another debut: the first-ever Sondheim show directed by Trevor Nunn, best known stateside for helming British-born megamusicals like Cats, Les Misérables and Sunset Boulevard.

"Why choose this one? It's an unassailable masterpiece," says Nunn. "It's perfect in its book, its music is exquisite, its lyrics are almost impossibly witty — they cross-reference each other, they have emotional depth as well as splendid verbal pyrotechnics." But don't let all that — or the fact that Night Music is based on a Swedish film from the '50s — scare you off.

"It's a great deal about sex," he continues. "The title that Woody Allen gave to his version of [Ingmar] Bergman's film was A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy, and it's perfect, because there are those two influences — A Midsummer Night's Dream, and that sexual craving in human beings that leads them astray, that leads them to do the most unforgivable or inexplicable things."

The plot centers on 40-something Fredrik (British actor Alexander Hanson), who is frustrated because his virginal, 18-year-old bride Anne (Ramona Mallory) is still, well, virginal. He's also pining for his ex-flame, the more-age-appropriate glamour-puss actress Desirée Armfeldt (Zeta-Jones), but he'll have to fight off (literally) the insanely jealous Count Carl-Magnus (Aaron Lazar), who's wed to the crafty Charlotte (Erin Davie). Meanwhile, Fredrik's moody, cello-playing son Henrik (Hunter Ryan Herdlicka) is carrying on with their hip-wiggling maid, Petra (Leigh Ann Larkin)…or at least he's trying to. ("Give it a nice rest," Petra advises.)  Continued...