‘Hairspray” is candy, but it’s good candy, and there’s a lot of it, which is about all you ought to ask of the stuff. Nearly two years after its opening night, the show remains relentless.With its tachycardia-inducing anthems and its string of top-drawer punchlines, it asks if you’re ready to enjoy yourself, and won’t take no for an answer.

The show is having a kind of second opening night to mark the arrival of new actors in the lead roles. Marissa Jaret Winokur, who made a crackling Broadway debut as the plump Tracy Turnblad, has been replaced by a spunky 19-year-old, Carly Jibson. Harvey Fierstein has turned over his housedress and slippers to Michael McKean, who now plays Edna Turnblad, Tracy’s mom.

Comparisons to the original cast are dubious. Is Mr. McKean “better” than his predecessor? Of course not, but how could he be? The part was custom-tailored to Mr. Fierstein and his outsized charisma. Ms. Jibson lacks Ms. Winokur’s preternatural cuteness. There are more rough edges now, which means more comic punch. The new leads serve mostly to shift the show’s tone and emphasis.

Designers know that adding a color to a costume can bring out all the other appearances of that color onstage. (In this show, the options run from hot pink to lime green to electric blue, and some that I don’t have adjectives for.) The same goes for acting. Mr. Fierstein was gruff but warm, a maternal presence that made you aware of all the sunny wholesomeness in the show. Mr. McKean is more saturnine; there’s a hint of a curled lip. Once you focus on his sourness, you start noticing all sorts of reminders that this musical was derived from a John Waters movie, not a John Hughes one. For example: When Tracy tells mom she can’t wait to be famous, Edna says if that’s all she wants, she should “learn how to get blood out of car upholstery.”

The really significant casting changes here happen just out of the spotlight. I take it back: The changes are so significant they bring the spotlight with them. Tracy’s best friend, hopelessly ditzy Penny Pingleton, is now played by Jennifer Gambatese. Seaweed J. Stubbs, her dusky paramour, is played by Chester Gregory II. Thanks to the actors’ immense charisma and a willingness to go all out with the material, their subplot has become the most engaging part of the show.

Ms. Gambatese has got the voice, the moves, the looks, and a knack for comedy; she’s going places. At the Apollo last year, Mr. Gregory blazed through the song catalog and onstage antics of Jackie Wilson. It’s terrific to see him return to the stage, particularly when, say, he jumps off a waist-high platform and lands in a split. Someone needs to write a musical for this man, fast.

I’d say that Mr. Gregory and Ms. Gambatese are running away with the show, but what’s to run away with? They may shift our attention away 257 788 322 800from the fun at center stage, but only to supply their own. “Hairspray” is turning out to be a hardier show than “The Producers,” which loses some of its luster when Lane and Broderick are out of town.

Speaking of out of town, it’s always a delight to compare the reaction of an early audience to one deep in the run. Two years ago, the show’s teen heartthrob character got a big laugh when he complained to his friends, “Those girls were all over me. I don’t know how Rock Hudson stands it.” Today, not a peep.

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At the risk of sounding like a critic, I don’t see what anybody’s doing at a theater these days, not when the sun sets at 8:30 and there’s so much sky and beach and park. If you take a dim view of the current onstage offerings, two treats have come your way.

For your reading enjoyment comes “On Broadway, Men Still Wear Hats,” a new collection of profiles byPlaybill.comeditor (and Sun contributor) Robert Simonson. Its subtitle captures its essence: “Unusual Lives Led on the Edges of Broadway.” It sharpens the mystery of how New York theater turns out so much bland fare: The place is full of some of the most colorful types you’d ever hope to meet.

Mr. Simonson provides backstory on familiar faces (Angus McIndoe, Michael Riedel), but mostly takes us on a tour of Broadway’s engine room. There’s Kenneth Brown, who works as Nathan Lane’s dresser, and does it so assiduously that he’s compressed a disc in his back. There’s Playbill writer Louis Botto, who “refers to raccoons as his friends and wakes up every night at three in the morning to feed them.” And there’s Mel Cohen, who runs B &J Fabrics, and whose dialogue runs to the Runyonesque: “Theater people are very legitimate kind of people.Very seldom do we have a problem with theater customers. They almost always pay their bills.”

An elegiac tone pervades the profiles. Mr. Simonson is not confident that the theater of Clear Channel and Disney has room for these personalities. The book leaves me more optimistic. If so many people are willing to work for peanuts (which they are) while flouting the assumptions of how grown-ups are supposed to live (which they do), they will somehow find a way.

For your listening pleasure, meanwhile, comes the release from Bluebird of “It’s De Lovely,” a collection of Cole Porter songs pegged to the new Kevin Kline biopic. The selection is idiosyncratic, to say the least. One of America’s great lyricists is celebrated here with a couple of instrumental performances by Sonny Rollins and Coleman Hawkins.

The real draw is Porter himself singing “Anything Goes” and “You’re the Top” to the added accompaniment of Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks. Porter is not what you’d call a good singer, unless you savor the thought of Daffy Duck aping Noel Coward. His numbers have their felicities, though, as when “derby winner” comes out “darby winnah.”

The Sun’s Will Friedwald has written the percipient liner notes, which give you fresh reasons to admire Porter’s work.When you skip ahead to Sinatra’s rendition of “Night and Day” and twirl around the room with your sweetie, he needs no defending.