The hit list

The fifth time through, the tomato goes splat onto the floor of the Korean deli. Again.

The cast members of the new Broadway-bound musical ``High Fidelity" are a month away from opening night, practicing a sassy Aretha Franklin-style soul number in which a woman schools a man about his romantic hopelessness while vegetables are passed down a chorus line to a shopping bag on the counter. But the timing still isn't perfect. Luckily, the tomato is plastic.

Several hours later, they're painstakingly parsing every note in the gospel-inflected finale with endlessly upbeat co-orchestrator and music supervisor Alex Lacamoire. And this comes after multiple blocking sessions and run-throughs of four previous numbers, including a comical fantasy orgy scene. Steps are plotted, lines amended, and inflections adjusted. Choreographing how one character will flip another over on a bed takes about 20 minutes.

This is the nitty-gritty stuff that comes before the fragrant grease paint and the roaring crowds, and everyone here is happy to put in the long hours. The stakes for any Broadway musical -- even one based on a hit book and a hit movie -- are high. No one wants to suffer the fate of the tomato.

``I'm out of my mind with nerves," admits Jeffrey Seller over breakfast near the midtown Manhattan rehearsal studio. With his partners Robyn Goodman and Kevin McCollum, Seller is coproducing this adaptation of Nick Hornby's 1996 bestseller about a commitment-averse, rock-music-obsessed, Top 5 list-making record store owner. The show makes its world premiere at the Colonial Theatre Sept. 26. ``We have solicited our friends, family, colleagues for $10 million, and I have a fiduciary obligation to try to succeed with all of our investors' dollars," says Seller. ``That's weighty. Those people put their trust in us, and it's our job to deliver."

The last time the trio was expected to deliver, for the uproariously raunchy yet touching puppet romp ``Avenue Q," they did just that, winning the Tony Award for best musical in 2004. McCollum and Seller also earned a Tony for their previous collaboration, another Broadway baby with rock 'n' roll attitude, ``Rent."

That hard-to-come-by hardware is no guarantee of success, but it does allow everyone involved a little breathing room to whip this contemporary romantic comedy into shape.

The other reassuring element is Hornby's book, which got a 2000 film treatment starring John Cusack as the developmentally arrested main character, Rob, and Jack Black in his breakout role as acerbic rock elitist Barry. In the story, Rob, flummoxed after a breakup with live-in paramour Laura, searches his romantic history for clues about his inability to make love last. ``Basically this story is about Peter Pan getting dragged into maturity," says director Walter Bobbie. With laughs.

Ask nine people associated with the production why they wanted to be involved with it, and you get nine almost identical answers. In fact, the responses start to resemble dust - cover blurbs: ``The book is sensational!" says Seller. ``I loved the book!" says American Repertory Theatre-trained actor Jay Klaitz, who plays Barry.

``It was like receiving a present when I was in London working on `Chicago' and discovered Hornby. I just gobbled up everything he'd written," adds Bobbie, who won a Tony for directing that revival. ``I'm just a great fan of his sensibility, his wit, of how personal his books feel."

It was composer Tom Kitt who originally had the idea of a stage adaptation while reading ``High Fidelity" in 1999. ``I was crazy over the book -- and I am crazy over pop music and pop culture -- and it immediately seemed like an idea that sang to me," says the Long Island native over dinner with his songwriting partner, lyricist Amanda Green.

``We just started writing songs that turned us on from favorite moments in the story," says Green.

The pair, who met at one of Green's solo music performances in 1997 and began discussing the ``High Fidelity" concept in 2001, had various credits on and around big stages. Both have performed as pop musicians, Kitt was a conductor on ``Urban Cowboy," and together they've written material for stage star Kristin Chenoweth, but ``High Fidelity" will be the duo's Broadway debut as a composer-lyricist team.

By 2004 they had acquired the adaptation rights and written a batch of songs that they began to perform in cabarets and clubs with friends.

At first, not everyone was convinced it was a great idea. ``It's very difficult to find how a story is going to allow itself to sing," says Bobbie. But impressed by the songs, the producers came aboard, and the other creative pieces fell into place.

``The songs had such an irony . . . and really embraced Nick Hornby's sense of humor," says David Lindsay-Abaire, the South Boston native chosen to pen the musical's book. ``Amanda had taken a lot of his language from the book and put it straight into lyric."

The author has no reservations about the project. ``It's always interesting to see what other people want to do with your work," says Hornby by phone from London . He's been pleased with film adaptations of ``High Fidelity," ``About a Boy," and ``Fever Pitch," he says, and he's eager to see what will be done with his latest, ``A Long Way Down," optioned by Johnny Depp.

When it came to ``High Fidelity," ``I thought why not? They seemed like really talented and smart people," says Hornby, who plans to attend the Broadway opening night, Dec. 7 at the Imperial Theatre. ``I really trust the people who are doing it, I think they're great."

The creators never considered using songs mentioned in the book to make another one of the jukebox musicals that have played on Broadway. ``It's not like we're ignoring the fact that these guys work in a record shop. We reference real artists that they know and love," says playwright Lindsay-Abaire of shout-outs and Top 5 lists that include the Smiths, Marvin Gaye, and Iggy Pop. ``There are homages to those artists within the bodies of the songs."

That was a fun challenge, the songwriters say. ``We would listen to some of our [influences], and that would lead us down the right road," explains Kitt. The resulting show features songs that evoke everyone from Indigo Girls to Elvis Costello, the Clash, and Queen.

But would the rock-loving characters in ``High Fidelity" like this musical -- or any musical?

During a quick lunch break, Will Chase, who plays Rob, answers with a resounding ``No chance in hell." Klaitz hedges his bets, saying that Barry, whom he calls ``the sherriff of rockdom," might not love ``High Fidelity," but he would definitely dig ``Avenue Q." But Kitt is a firm believer: ``I think that Rob is someone who appreciates pop music to its extreme. He loves everything from the big huge ballads to the great indie music to the R&B stuff of the '50s. I think that if Rob had a chance to hear this music, there would be parts of it that would hook him."

For a definitive answer we went straight to the source. ``Rob I can see, but Barry I'm not sure," says Hornby with a laugh. ``If you told Barry he'd be appearing in a Broadway musical, he'd probably want to be shot."

Kitt and Green see that snobbery as a challenge to appeal to the Robs and Barrys of the world who might be apprehensive about seeing the show. ``Listen, there's going to be a lot of haters," acknowledges Green. ``But I hope they come in haters and when they see it, they'll say, `Hey they didn't ruin it, this was really great. They didn't cheese it up.' "

The creative team didn't shy away from the sex, profanity, and barbs lobbed at real-life musicians in the source material. When told that her show contains perhaps the most occurrences in Broadway history of a four-syllable swear word, Green quips, ``Certainly more than there are in `The Sound of Music.' " And if John Tesh, Diane Warren, or Art Garfunkel attend the show, they might want to practice their good-sport smiles.

The team is also prepared for its own critical and fan feedback when the show opens. ``Boston is a sophisticated town, and we're getting a barometer of what you can expect in New York," Green says.

The Hub tryout has special significance for two members of the ``Fidelity" creative team.

As a Boston native, Lindsay-Abaire had his first musical-theater experience at the Colonial, when he saw ``Annie." ``Nine years old in this huge theater, it was spectacular," he says.

Green's late father, Adolph Green -- half of a legendary Broadway team with Betty Comden, who cowrote the lyrics for ``On the Town" -- tried out several shows at the Colonial, including ``On the Twentieth Century" in the '60s. As a child of about 10, Green says, ``I remember seeing it and getting a sense of his out-of-town life working on the show, and it was incredibly exciting."

Stars Chase and Jenn Colella, who've experienced the sting of musicals not succeeding -- he in ``Lennon," she in ``Urban Cowboy" -- are upbeat.

``I quite frankly have more faith in this project than any project I ever started with before," says Colella, a blond beauty who is thrilled to be transitioning from perky ingenue to gravitas-wielding leading lady.

``My mom asks me all the time, `Is it going to be a hit?' I'm like, `Mom I have no idea, I'm going to show up and say my lines, ' " says Chase, who has the rakish slacker look that is catnip to young women everywhere and perfect for his character. ``Everything is in place for it to be that."

So for now the cast members can only learn those lines, practice passing those vegetables, warm up their voices, and wait.

When asked the No. 1 reason people should see ``High Fidelity," Chase likens seeing the show to the feeling of ``getting a great new album." Seller declares, ``I don't think there has ever been a rock score with lyrics this clever, witty, and funny before, ever."

And Klaitz offers up a near-threat his alter ego would love: ``If you're ready to rock, then you should come see `High Fidelity.' " And if you're unprepared to rock? ``Then go see `Sound of Music,' " he says with a laugh. ``I would say even if you're not ready to rock, this will turn you on to being ready to rock."