Hair, Al Hirschfeld Theatre, 302 W. 45th St.; $37-$122; Telecharge: Watching the ''tribe'' of players in the revival of Hair cavort around Central Park's Delacorte Theater last summer, the actors illuminated by stage lights and moonlight and whatever imaginary drugs powered their portrayals of '60s hippies, must have been a groovy experience. On Broadway, though Hair is favored to win the best musical revival Tony, the frolicsome mood feels a little more forced and faux, like today's style-over-substance peace-sign jewelry.

Still, director Diane Paulus and an exuberant cast -- including Tony nominees Will Swenson as Berger and Gavin Creel as Claude -- largely deliver the celebratory, defiant, anxious spirit of the 1967 original, which includes such tunes-turned-classics as Aquarius, Easy to Be Hard, Good Morning Starshine, Let the Sun Shine In and the title song. And there is contemporary resonance, certainly, in the travails of Claude, a young man sent off to fight and die in a controversial war.

Next to Normal, Booth Theatre, 222 W. 45th St.; $36.50-$116.50; Telecharge: In a year without Billy Elliot, Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey's Next to Normal would likely take the best musical Tony. As it is, Alice Ripley should be honored for her stunning portrayal of Diana, a wife and mother whose bipolar disorder has left her with a tenuous grip on reality.

At first, Diana seems like a sexy supermom, a lusty wife to her husband Dan (J. Robert Spencer), attentive to son Gabe (Aaron Tveit) and her angry daughter Natalie (Jennifer Damiano). Too soon, the facade cracks, and Diana is manically assembling sandwiches on the kitchen floor.

Kitt's driving rock score also draws from other musical styles to create an emotional, intricate whole. Yorkey's slowly revelatory book and lyrics explore what led to Diana's shattered mental state. Michael Greif, who staged both Rent and Grey Gardens, seems the ideal director for a musical about the fragility and resilience of the human spirit.

9 to 5: The Musical, Marquis Theatre, 1535 Broadway; $66.50-$126.50; Ticketmaster: The mainstream movie-to-musical parade goes on, this season with 9 to 5: The Musical. To say that the result is better than Legally Blonde the Musical is probably damning with faint praise, but the stage versions of three put-upon office workers have more comedic woman power than pretty-in-pink Elle Woods.

Based on the 1980 movie by screenwriter Patricia Resnick, the musical pairs a Resnick book with Dolly Parton's score, including the movie's famous title song and Backwoods Barbie, Parton's version of an autobiography and the title tune of her latest CD.

Allison Janney, Stephanie J. Block and Megan Hilty assume the roles played in the movie by Lily Tomlin, Jane Fonda and Parton. As with those who have tried to erase memories of Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde, the Broadway Violet, Judy and Doralee wind up being an amalgam of what audiences loved about them in the movie and what three talented performers bring to the roles. Former South Floridian Marc Kudisch, however, is deliciously vile as Franklin Hart Jr., the sexist boss whom the women -- and we -- love to hate.

reasons to be pretty, Lyceum Theatre, 149 W. 45th St.; $31.50-$111.50; Telecharge: Neil LaBute, the playwright-director who has given the world such pungent examples of male failings and superficiality as Fat Pig and In the Company of Men, makes a belated Broadway debut with reasons to be pretty -- same theme in a fine new play stingingly directed by Terry Kinney, one of the guys who founded Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre.

The story involves Greg (Thomas Sadoski), whom we meet in the midst of a raging argument with his girlfriend Steph (Marin Ireland). Seems Greg failed to protest when his work pal Kent (Steven Pasquale) suggested that Steph wasn't exactly good looking; Kent's wife Carly (Piper Perabo) overheard and squealed to Steph. LaBute's characters go on to explore betrayal, regret and self-sabotage. The writing and acting are so observant that you may walk out of the theater teary-eyed. Or bawling, even.

West Side Story, Palace Theatre, 1564 47th St.; $46.50-$121.50; Ticketmaster: Last season, director-playwright Arthur Laurents staged a triumphant revival of Gypsy, the 1959 musical for which he wrote the book, a show originally directed and choreographed by the great Jerome Robbins. This season, Laurents has revisited another of his shows with Robbins, a musical classic featuring a score by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by a then-young Stephen Sondheim.

The 90-year-old Laurents has brought West Side Story back to Broadway but with a twist: For the first time, the Puerto Rican characters spend some of the time singing and speaking in Spanish. The device works, and the performances by Josefina Scaglione (Maria), Karen Olivo (Anita), and George Akram (Bernardo) are the richer for the choice, which feels right for a 21st century West Side Story and a different America.

Still, what gives West Side Story its enduring power isn't the way Laurents has focused on his inspired-by-Shakespeare book. It is Bernstein's soaring score and Robbins' dazzling dances that make the musical forever thrilling.

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