“The Baker’s Wife” offers dual stories of redemption that make it feel designed for the holidays: There is the fable of all the villagers in a small French town setting aside their petty squabbles to repair their baker’s marriage, thus giving them back their daily bread.   

Then there is the equally unlikely story of a 1976 musical with great promise – composed by Stephen Schwartz, the 28-year-old wunderkind at the time who had three hit shows running on Broadway simultaneously (Pippin, The Magic Show, and Godspell),  with a book by legendary, Tony-winning librettist Joseph Stein (“Fiddler on the Roof”)  – that was such an unfixable flop during a grueling cross-country pre-Broadway tryout tour that the members of the creative team themselves insisted to producer David Merrick that he shut down “The Baker’s Wife” before its intended Broadway run.

But the score lived on, thanks to a cast recording, and three decades later, director Gordon Greenberg did a production of the musical at Paper Mill Playhouse in New Jersey that finally made Schwartz happy. 

Now, two decades after that, Greenberg is once again at the helm, in a production at Classic Stage Company that I found so inviting that it’s hard for me to fathom  what went wrong half a century ago and why they thought it was unfixable.

Stephen Schwartz’s French-inflected score is sometimes comic, sometimes heartfelt, and consistently lovely. The design gives us a convincing taste of a provincial town in Provence, France, with Catherine Zuber’s precisely considered costumes,  and shelves full of obviously real bagettes, croissants, tartes and eclairs, even while Jason Sherwood’s set design and Bradley King’s lighting subtly suggest how fanciful the fable that unfolds. The cast full of impressive Broadway talent, led by Scott Bakula as the baker Aimable Castagnet and Ariana DeBose as Geneviève, is positively inspiring, creating a cast of distinctive characters who together convey a sense of a living community – as well as a lesson in ensemble acting. 

This I suppose was not a given. In the wrong hands, the town of Concorde could have been rendered a French Munchkinland, its denizens a collection of cute caricatures.   

Judy Kuhn offers the first indication that we are in the right hands, with the first song, “Chanson,” welcoming us and introducing us to the town and its inhabitants. She is Denise, the wise-cracking wife of the owner of the local café, as Claude (Bob Cuccioli) with whom she has less than a romantic relationship. Few of the relationships in the town are models of conviviality or even propriety. Claude won’t speak directly to Barnaby (Manu Narayan) because their fathers and grandfathers feuded with each other as well, although nobody knows why. Barnaby is dismissive of his wife Hortense (Sally Murphy) to the point of abuse. The town’s professor, the only one to read a newspaper (Arnie Burton) argues with the town’s priest (Will Roland.) Therese, the town’s unmarried scold (Alma Cuervo) disapproves of everybody.  Antoine, the town’s tactless drunk (Kevin Del Aguila) antagonizes everybody.  Only the town’s mayor, the aristocratic Marquis (Nathan Lee Graham) gets along with everybody – but too much so; he surrounds himself with a trio of young women. “They are my nieces,” he says, to which the priest replies: “You are forgetting: I am your confessor.”

These tensions are expressed in the comic number “If It Wasn’t For You”

Life is hard enough for me
with all my cares and labors
Why must i be burdened with
such irritating neighbors?!

Into this longstanding web of bickerers arrives the new baker, Aimable, with his much younger wife of three years, Genevieve.  The town’s old baker had died weeks before, and the town was aching for the new one, so that they could get the fresh baguettes that made their day.  On the morning after he arrives, already at work on the boulangerie, there  is terrifically directed musical number “Bread” that puts a series of spotlight on a different villager in a different part of the village, when they first smell the newly baked bread by the newly hired baker.

Soon, the marquis’ hunky driver Dominique (a hunky Kevin William Paul) puts the moves on Genevieve, wooing her with “Proud Lady,” and she  eventually succumbs, running off with him. (an excuse for choreographer Stephanie Klemons to go to town)

Genevieve wrestles with her choice in the song that’s by far the most famous in the score, “Meadowlark” (I understand its appeal, but I prefer the simpler “Chanson.”)

The baker is too distraught to continue creating the baguettes that the townsfolk crave, so they decide collectively to convince her to come back – which we are meant to understand is the first time in generations, if ever, that the townsfolk worked together on anything.  

 It’s understandable why theatergoers focus on the baker’s wife. That’s the title of the show, after all, and DeBose, the only one in the cast to get entrance applause, is unquestionably glamorous in the role. (So, actually is Bakula, which is at odds with “La Femme du Boulanger,” the 1938 French movie that Schwartz and Stein adapted, in which Aimable was portrayed by the one-named actor Raimu as a complete shlub.) But, to me, if there is any resonance in “The Baker’s Wife”  beyond a fun, well-sung fable, it is in the way the townsfolk, and the performers who bring them to life, work together.

The Baker’s Wife
Classic Stage Company through December 21
Running time: Two hours and 30 minutes including one intermission
Tickets: $66 – $236
Book by Joseph Stein
Music & Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz
Based on the film La Femme du Boulanger by Marcel Pagnol, adapted from Jean le Bleu by Jean Giono
Choreographed by Stephanie Klemons
Directed by Gordon Greenberg
Music direction by Charlie Alterman
Set design by Jason Sherwood, costume design by Catherine Zuber, lighting design by Bradley King, sound design by Jason Crystal, hair and wig design by Tom Watson

Cast: Scott Bakula as Aimable Castagnet, Ariana DeBose as Geneviève Castagnet, Wendi Bergamin, Savannah Lee Birdsong as Simone, Arnie Burton as Teacher, Robert Cuccioli as Claude,Alma Cuervo as Therese, Kevin Del Aguila as Antoine, Bill English, Zachary Freier-Harrison, Samantha Gershman as Inez, Nathan Lee Graham as Marquis, Judy Kuhn as Denise, Sally Murphy as Hortense, Manu Narayan as Barnaby, Mason Olshavsky as Philippe,  Kevin William Paul as Dominique,Will Roland as the priest, and Hailey Thomas as Nicole