She arrived on May 4, right on T.D. Day (Tony Deadline Day, or was it Theatre Development Day, or could it be Touchdown Day?); in any event, she sealed the season with a Cinderella kiss, adding a new ripple to mythic Broadway lore. Hers is the one about the raw kid out of the chorus—not even that (television!)—who, according to her Playbill bio, `is thrilled to be fulfilling a lifelong dream by making her Broadway debut.'

Hobbling toward the bright lines in a densely troubled show, she made a misstep with a stage lamppost in Chicago and broke her foot, and a more experienced performer (Charlotte d'Amboise) took over the part for Boston, where producers Fran and Barry Weissler (for wont of a more polite word) bailed. It was at this critical juncture that Applegate dug in her stiletto heels (heel, at this point), reportedly ran to the tomtoms to drum up more money for Weisslers and got the show back on the road to Broadway where d'Amboise kept the role warm for her until the doctors said she could go on—only 14 performances before the opening.

Whew! "Everything but the bloodhounds snapping at her rear end," as Birdie Coonan was once heard to observe. It's impossible not to see this subtext running alongside the show at hand, not to speculate about how Applegate may have used recent misfortunes to build a character of sparkplug spunk. The show and its encircling myth are quite compatible.

"I'm so glad I insisted," Applegate admitted a couple of hours after her debut when she arrived for the premiere party at Guastavino's. "Nobody told me that doesn't happen. In Hollywood, you have to stop people from pushing so hard. I just figured, `Hey, no way. You're not taking my show.' I've felt a lot of passion in my life, but I've never felt passion for something like this. I also felt a responsibility due to the fact I broke my foot and that's why we closed. I broke my foot, and that's why 200 people had their jobs taken away from them. It was really within me that I felt responsible to fight for this show."

Her hubby, actor Jonathan Schaech, didn't exactly have his appetite for Broadway whetted by this experience. "I wouldn't want to go through what my wife went through to get up there on that," he allowed without thinking twice, "but the talent that's involved in Broadway is mind-boggling. Even before this, I was sorta blown away by that fact."

He's looking to put a little distance between his wife's adventure into theatre and his trying his own hand on the New York stage. A pilot for CBS, called "Commuters," may do the trick. 'We'll find out if it has been picked up next week. It's about three couples who travel into the city. David Arquette and Christine Keller head the cast."

Charity's leading mensch, Denis O'Hare, showed relief, and a touch of disbelief, at actually getting back on Broadway. 'You know what? There are no villains here, only heroes," he said. "Everyone is a hero. Christina is a hero. Charlotte is a hero. The producers who stepped in are heroes. I'm just glad we got to open this show here."

O'Hare's last two Broadway outings got him in the Tony running—successfully for Take Me Out, less so for Assassins—and this one will likely do the same, but where? His role of the hilariously hysterical nebbish who falls for the goldhearted Charity is the sort that straddles categories: John McMartin was Tony-nominated in the starring category for the 1966 original, and Michael Rupert won the Tony in the featured category for the 1986 revival. (Hours after the opening, the Tony Awards Administration Committee rules O'Hare would compete in the featured category.) "My biggest job is being backstage for the first 45 minutes of the show, trying not to think about it—you know what I mean? I read a lot."

Charity and his character, Oscar, meet cute at the tail end of the first act—trapped in a stalled elevator while his claustrophobia bubbles to the surface. Director Walter Bobbie has platformed O'Hare's hysteria as if it were the first-act finale song (comedically, it is). "The scene is by Neil Simon, so it's really well-written, which helped," he said. 'What we did was—Walter and Christina and I just got into a room and didn't worry about being lost. We thought `What is the reality?' The reality is: Here is a guy in a space with a pretty girl he'd like to talk to and he's loosing his mind. He wants to be cool and can't."

Janine LaManna and Kyra Da Costa, as Charity's best buds at the dance hall where they're employed for a little more than ten cents a dance, arrived late into the show, replacing Natascia Diaz and Solange Sandy on the road. 'We're definitely a family now," Da Costa declared, catching at long last a light at the end of the tunnel. "The cast that was already established just opened their arms and their hearts to us and really welcomed us, and I appreciate that. It makes the job easier to have friends on stage."

LaManna, playing the tartest of tarts with a tell-tale Eve Arden edge, rates the Tony once-over she didn't get her last time out with the Weisslers—as Seussical's fluttery, feathery Gertrude McFuzz. "I'd love it to happen," she said. "If it doesn't, I have the same attitude I had with Seussical: If I have the support of my community, that's my Tony." Continued...