Pigeon? Pinwheel? Sometimes it’s fun to picture a writer at work. Take Richard Brinsley Sheridan. In 1775, not yet 23, Sheridan let fly with his sparkling comedy “The Rivals.” Porcupine? Persimmon? It describes a loony courtship in Bath, where various suitors pursue Lydia Languish, the wily niece of the dignified, word-slaughtering Mrs. Malaprop. Poinsettia? Pushcart? I like to imagine young Sheridan, feet propped on his desk, searching for the right wrong word to give his most enduring creation. Ah yes, there it is: Mrs. Malaprop will congratulate a suitor for being “the very pineapple of politeness.”

You don’t need to think overmuch about Sheridan to enjoy Lincoln Center’s new revival of his classic comedy. Under the direction of Mark Lamos, the sharp edges and broad surfaces of “The Rivals” mostly gleam. It ought to shine more brightly here and there (in some places it barely twinkles, forget about shine) but the cast, led by Richard Easton, Dana Ivey, and a handful of gifted young actors, makes its artifice terrifically funny.

This being Lincoln Center, many in the audience may still wish to know about their playwright. (The rest of you can skip this part.) Sheridan was the son of an actor-manager father and a mother who was known to write a play herself. Like all of England’s best playwrights – except Him, of course – he was Irish. Best of all, he wrote “The Rivals” as something like an exercise in autobiography. Sheridan, like half the male population of Bath (or so history records), fell in love with the beautiful young singer Elizabeth Linley. He whisked her away to France, where they secretly married. On his return, he fought a pair of duels with her jilted suitors, nursing the injury he sustained with the tonic properties of enormous newfound fame. Think of Sheridan as the anti-O’Neill: He turns autobiography not into morose drama, but into high, glittering comedy.

In “The Rivals,” hyper-romantic Lydia (Emily Bergl) would like nothing better than to defy her family and scamper off with her declasse beau, Ensign Beverley. But her aunt (Dana Ivey) insists on marrying her off to the more respectable Captain Jack Absolute (Matt Letscher). What Lydia doesn’t know is that her beloved Beverley is really Jack in disguise. Even Jack’s father, Sir Anthony Absolute (Richard Easton), wants nothing more than to see him marry the girl he’s already pursuing. There’s plenty of confusion but little real conflict. A century before Wilde and two centuries before Larry David, Sheridan wrote a comedy more or less about nothing.

Trouble percolates around the margins: The bumbling rustic Bob Acres (Jeremy Shamos) and the pugilistic Irishman Sir Lucius O’Trigger (Brian Murray) both have designs on Lydia, and duels loom. But physical comedy wasn’t in Sheridan’s line. “The Rivals” is almost totally a comedy of personality and language. Style is paramount. The play will only work onstage if it’s crisp, bright, and fast, fast, fast.

At the Vivian Beaumont, the show makes an encouraging start with James Urbaniak, effortlessly brilliant as Jack’s conniving servant. Mr. Urbaniak has won a much-deserved following downtown and onscreen in the last few years: It’s remarkable, though not surprising, to see that his quiver also contains such a grasp of period style. Mr. Letscher, who plays Jack, has been less familiar until now, working mostly in regional theater. That is about to change. In a performance that amounts to a minor revelation, he gives the show a bright center, playing off both the audience and his co-stars with aplomb.

They aren’t any old co-stars, either. As the petulant, bossy Sir Anthony, Mr. Easton gives his most complete performance since “The Invention of Love.” He adorns the role with all sorts of gorgeous, silly embroidery. It’s a big performance but it never overreaches: a model of period finesse. Ms. Ivey doesn’t wring Mrs. Malaprop entirely dry, but both women are sufficiently vivid to make her scenes sing. Ms. Ivey’s best moment comes last, a curtain line for the ages. “O Sir Anthony,” she complains, with timing that would shame an atomic clock, “men are all Bavarians.”

Elsewhere the production doesn’t respond as well to Mr. Lamos’s polishing. A secondary romance between Faulkland (Jim True-Frost) and Julia (Carrie Preston) tends to bog down. I can’t decipher what Mr. Murray is doing, but it’s not playing an Irish caricature so wicked that it sparked noisy controversy on the play’s opening night. The only thing that keeps his scenes from collapsing is Mr. Shamos. He’s broad here and there, even for Bob Acres, but his grand, hilarious flourishes prop up the play’s second half. The sight of him approaching the climactic duel dressed very like the Mad Hatter won’t fade anytime soon.

Scenic designer John Lee Beatty uses the exterior of a manor and a donut-shaped revolve to tame the Beaumont. The set reminded me of the revival that played here a year ago, and made me appreciate anew the towering, almost planetary scenery that Ralph Funicello designed for “Henry IV.” Like Shakespeare’s twin masterpieces, Sheridan’s comedy has been edited severely for the Lincoln Center crowd. This time, however, the cuts seem judicious; they keep the show lively. But it won’t do to look backwards this way. As a wise woman is fond of saying, “We will not anticipate the past! So mind, young people – our retrospection will be all to the future.”

Until January 23 (150 West 65 Street, Lincoln Center, 212-239-6200).