"The Who's Tommy" a rousing, rocking musical at full tilt

There are two things any production of "The Who's Tommy" has to do right. It has to move. And it has to rock.

Happily, the Village Theatre's invigorating version of the Pete Townshend musical does both.

This fable of childhood trauma and adult recovery — first heard in an innovative 1969 "concept album" by Townshend's band the Who — has little spoken dialogue. The songs are repetitive, with key phrases ("See me, feel me, touch me, heal me") heard again and again.

But director and co-writer (with Townshend) Des McAnuff's Broadway transformation of "Tommy" in 1993 gave it new life, thanks to a master-blast of movement, song, MTV-generation visuals and muscular guitar riffs.

At the Village, Brian Yorkey's mounting adds some flourishes. It is bookended by the silent appearance of a modern kid in a hoody, finding a cache of vinyl LPs from the 1960s by (who else?) the Who, among others.

Then the show sweeps you into a swirl of power chords, songs with sharp hooks, and the terrific lighting and projections of Alex Berry.

And it says much about this "Tommy" that it is engrossing, despite vocals amplified so loud, you'd hear the lyrics better wearing earplugs.

Though psychologically simplistic, "Tommy" still resonates through its musical urgency and dreamspace stagecraft, and its mythic "lost boy" theme.

Michael K. Lee (last seen at the Village in "The Wedding Banquet") sings beautifully and makes an excellent, ethereal adult Tommy. (He also wisely tailors his dynamics to the magnum-force amplification.)

The grown-up Tommy drifts through flashbacks of his British parents' World War II courtship and the traumas of his youth: a domestic shooting that made him "deaf, dumb and blind." The sexual abuse by his smarmy Uncle Ernie (Matt Wolfe). The long hunt by his parents (played by Brandon O'Neill and Catherine Carpenter Cox) for a cure for their silent, unresponsive son.

Cute younger actors (Zachary Robinson, Rachel Lau) alternate as 4-year-old Tommy. And young Bryan Sevener is convincingly eerie as Tommy at 10.

Lisa Estridge gets her Tina Turner on for the "Acid Queen" number. (La Turner co-starred in the 1975 film of "Tommy.") And Jadd Davis, as Cousin Kevin, is a rollicking punkster.

What keeps the show popping most, though, are Kathryn Van Meter's athletic ensemble dances and music director Tim Symons' kick-butt pit band. Listen closely to the score, and in addition to the patented Who rock sound, you'll hear the doo-wop, madrigal and blues influences that inform it.

Berry's dazzling projections and kinetic lighting help keep up the pacing, as does Yorkey's use of a stage turntable.

A few cavils: The sound imbalances. Those British accents come and go. And the ending — a gushy homage to '60s rock avatars like Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix et al. — makes an odd coda for a show that celebrates the "freedom" of real-life normalcy.

"I'm free / And freedom tastes of reality," Townshend wrote. No wonder the guy just celebrated his 62nd birthday. Janis and Jimi lived hard and died young, before they could figure that out.

Misha Berson: mberson@seattletimes.com