DEXTER, Mich.–Hello Dolly is a show known for needing an actress to play the bigger-than-life Dolly Levi. The recent Broadway revival featured actress Bette Midler, who seems born to play the role. Likewise, Marlene Inman, seems born to play the role, or rather she has matured into the role that seems to have her name on it to the point the Encore Musical Theatre here could have called it Hello Marlene.

Pushy, sassy, delightful, funny, sarcastic, Dolly Levi has to make us root for her while she works her wiles on Horace Vandergelder (Keith Kalinowski), and keeps herself on a higher social plane than her dwindling purse (she is a widow) might allow. Her current wealth lies in her belovedness as the best known matchmaker in Yonkers, and her larger than life presence around the village of Yonkers. Inman has a natural pied-piper personality that infuses Dolly with all the qualities the show writers intended–ones that make people want to follow her, hold any door, step aside when she enters a room, or forgive almost any transgression.

The story is based on Thornton Wilder’s, “The Matchmaker,” which was in turn adapted from his earlier story, “The Merchant of Yonkers,” The musical by Michael Stewart and Jerry Herman has eclipsed any thought of the earlier works thanks to the signature performance of Carol Channing on Broadway in the 1960s, Barbra Streisand in the Gene Kelly-directed film and now Midler in the revival.

Indeed, the show has always seemed to me to feel a bit manufactured as a vehicle to let a strong actress and singer shine brightly to sell matinee tickets for the train and tunnel crowd around New York City.

The story takes place in Yonkers in the 1800s, then a sleepy village 20 miles North of Manhattan where VanderGelder is a prosperous owner of a hay and feed store. He employs two young clerks, Cornelius Hackl (Doug Atkins) and Barnaby Tucker (Cole Thompson), who don’t make much money and are bristling under the dominance of their boss. They are also seeking love, especially Cornelius, who is 33 and more than ready to find a love to complete his life. He conveniently falls in love with Mrs. Irene Molloy (Sarah Brown). A sub-plot is that Vandergelder’s niece, Ermengarde (Anna Dreslinki Cooke), who can’t ever seem to stop crying over something, is looking to marry .

To be honest, plot is a bit thin in Hello Dolly. What there is of plot seems more like contrivance to give these folks an excuse to sing. But that’s okay, because the Jerry Herman tunes are catchy and leave you humming when you are going to your car.

Kalinowski plays a very good Vandergelder. Both victim and prize for Dolly, he plays Horace with enough confounded comedy without losing the curmudgeonly aspect of the man that needs to persist to keep the story going until the end when Dolly’s charms melt the frozen butter of his resistance. Mr. Atkins is a delight to watch as Hackl, reminding me more than a little bit of a young Dick Van Dyke in the role. Mr. Thompson, too, plays Barnaby in a lovable manner. Sarah Brown has a second banana kind of place on the cast to Dolly as any woman on stage does here, but she has such wonderful vocal talent and lovely stage presence that she shines just enough without upstaging Inman’s star.

Music direction and delivery by Casey Baker is adequate, though the brass instruments could be tighter in their playing as a few places in the performance sagged a little. Keyboards by Daniel Bachelis on opening night kept things grounded.

The only place where this Dolly lacks is with the set design and construction. The Encore has been raising the bar each season, and has shown us its capacity to create first-rate sets on its small stage (Into The Woods, Noises Off and Into The Wild were stand-out set designs). This set is very disappointing to the point where I would urge the company to do some remedial work on it before the run is over. It’s just not up to the effort and work of the actors and singers. Of particular disappointment is the staircase down which Dolly makes a dramatic entrance in Act 2, which looks so cheaply made that a riser popped off the bottom step on opening night. This is a fancy restaurant. Could the designers not have employed actual bannisters rather than sloppily cut plywood? The piece spins around to create a bench for the Judge (Dale Dobson) for courtroom scene and number and the sloppy construction shows in the transition. These actors are killing it on stage, and they deserve a bit more investment in the set. The skyline painting behind the acting space also doesn’t work very well either.

Costumes by Sharon Larkey Urick are excellent. She nailed the period dress and hats, going a long way toward making up for shortfalls on the set. Choreography is quite good, even with actors who don’t look like dancing is their first talent, so kudos to choreographer Rachel Costantino and dance captain Josh England.

Another quibble is with a signature food scene that features Dolly tearing into an expensive dinner. Director Jamie Colburn seems to have given Dolly the equivalent of a Lunchables package on a plate in a fancy restaurant. What is called for pretty obviously, employed by many other directors of this show, is something like a turkey leg to really give Dolly something to make a meal of.

Production quibbles aside, the actors, including a very strong ensemble featuring Dobson, Xavier J. Bush, Angela Hench, Michael Hardy Gayle E. Martin, Connor Giles, Katy MacCutcheon (as Minnie Fay), Brianna Hall, Josh England, Mitchell J. Hardy, Meg McNamee, Isaac A. Orr, Trevor J. Powell, Matilda Seagraves more than deliver on what we want, which is a bright, fun, sassy, Queen of Yonkers in Dolly, and Inman and company give us just that.

With a month full of Christmas-themed shows around Michigan, Hello Dolly is a treat, and a trip to another time with a sunny cast led by Marlene Inman to deliver on a great score.

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