The amusing play title might ring a distant bell: “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change.”

A whimsical sketch comedy/musical revue from the 1990s is up next at the Laguna Playhouse, as the theater continues a season in part re-examining works from its 100-year history. The new production of the four-actor show, now accompanied by a live three-piece combo playing the original score, may seem to be little more than harmless fun. It’s certainly simple enough: a light-hearted look at the eternal foibles in the mating dance between men and women.

But it’s much more to the Laguna Playhouse. It’s not overstatement to say this was an energizing gamechanger at a crucial moment in the theater’s history.

While the total number of plays mounted by the Laguna Playhouse over a century is uncertain, “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change” is possibly its most successful production ever at the box office.

Entering the late 1990s, the Laguna Playhouse typically staged a six-show season that ran fall to spring.

This chaffed the theater’s executive director of the time, Richard Stein, who ran the playhouse for 17 years and has headed up ArtsOC, the independent nonprofit arts council of Orange County, for the past 15 years.

“I just thought it was absolutely crazy that we could not produce during peak tourist season,” Stein said, recollecting the situation back then. “It was a huge opportunity lost to develop audiences and to generate revenue.”

But summer posed external, complicating issues, including a key one that anybody who drives to Laguna Beach in the summer worries about: parking.

The elephant next door on Laguna Canyon Road, The Pageant of the Masters — eternally the town’s unrivaled nightly summer tourism draw — was not thrilled about the theater competing for parking spaces, if not at the turnstiles.

But local politics and logistics got worked out.

In fall 1997, the playhouse staged a production of “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change.” After a successful run Off-Broadway, Laguna Playhouse had acquired rights to the revue’s West Coast premiere.

“It sold out before it even opened,” recalled former artistic director Andrew Barnicle of the initial fall production. “At the time we had 10,000 subscribers. And our regular subscribers told all their friends.”

In separate phone interviews Stein and Barnicle recounted what came next in the animated tones that entertainment impresarios get when they recall having a hit on their hands:

Barnicle: “We felt from that fall this one would do well with single-ticket buying tourists”…

Stein: “So we had 64 performances in the summer — entirely sold out!”…

Barnicle: “There was such demand, people coming to the box office just hoping for ticket cancellations”…

Stein: “A gross well over a million dollars! Between the fall subscription and the single tickets that summer, it put a new roof on the building, new air conditioning units …

Barnicle: “(It) made enough extra money for us to hire three more people. And lead to a  season with more shows”…

Stein: “And we went on to have a couple other big draws the summers after. Word of mouth about the theater had stuck; this one brought us widespread attention we hadn’t had before.”

Of course, that was then and this is now.

The underlying question in 2022 is whether a light revue that connected strongly with audiences a quarter of a century ago can resonate today.

Veteran director and choreographer Paula Hammons Sloan, currently overseeing rehearsals for the upcoming production, is optimistic that the themes driving the piece still apply.

“Underneath,’’ said Sloan, “is (a show) about the longing to connect, finding a way to getting through all the thorns of connecting, how you do that.

“The ugly truths,” she added with a laugh, “can be funny.”

In a review in this newspaper of the production 25 years ago, the universal quality of the ugly truths was felt to be the key to the comedy’s success: “…imagine someone had secretly taped the most embarrassing moments of your love life, the stuttering introductions, the dumb come-ons, the lies, the terrors of self-doubt in front of the bathroom mirror.”

Another advantage for the show going forward is that playwright Joe DiPietro built in instructions to the script that allows liberal changes to keep references fresh and topical.

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Sloan is the person charged with making these swap-outs in Laguna. She found while the humor is still well intact, some of the phrasing had timed out and wouldn’t necessarily land.

“Like, there was a reference to AOL, what was it, “Chat”? So, instead, it’s now Match.com.”

Unlike in a full musical, where characters must develop, the sketch nature here — four actors, two men, two women, play more than 60 characters — has led Sloan to rehearse the piece in chronological order so that the fundamental needs for tight pacing and broader scale are better established in the performances.

“Our music director Ricky Pope said a perfect thing the other day for the cast: ‘Land on the large side of the truth with everything you do,’” Sloan said.

As with her cast — “I’m having a great time with these kids” — Sloan is under the sway of “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change”

“It’s charming and heartfelt. And there’s lots for people to recognize themselves in here.”

‘I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change’

Where: Laguna Playhouse, 606 Laguna Canyon Rd., Laguna Beach

When: Wednesday, April 20 through May 8.  7:30 p.m. Wednesdays-Fridays, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays, 1 p.m. Sundays. Check online for bonus single-day performances.

Tickets: $51-81

Information: 949-497-2787; lagunaplayhouse.com

COVID-19 protocols: The first two weeks of performances are for fully vaccinated patrons only, followed by select open performances for all audiences (check the theater’s website for specific dates.)  Required proof of vaccination is the physical COVID-19 Vaccination Record Card issued at the time of vaccination or a photograph of the COVID-19 Vaccination Record Card or a digital vaccination record. Proof of negative Covid-19 PCR test within 48 hours of performance time will be accepted at the performances in lieu of a vaccination card. For the vaccinated performances, wearing a mask is recommended; for the open performances, masks are required.