Entertainment

Funny-girl Babs inspires comedy

When shows are inspired by stars, they tend to be either fawning tributes or studies in self-destruction. With Judy Garland alone, just think of Rufus Wainwright’s enamored cover of her Carnegie Hall show and Broadway’s “End of the Rainbow.”

The great thing about Jonathan Tolins’ fantastically funny “Buyer & Cellar” is that it’s neither.

Tolins (“The Twilight of the Golds,” “Secrets of the Trade”) was inspired by a fascinating fact: Barbra Streisand has accumulated so many trinkets over the decades that she displays them in cutesy “shoppes” in her Malibu house’s basement — it’s all displayed in her coffee-table book “My Passion for Design.”

What Tolins invented is her hiring of a young unemployed actor, Alex More — the adorable Michael Urie, of TV’s “Ugly Betty” — to run those stores. Tolins has Alex open with a disclaimer: “What I’m going to tell you could not possibly have happened with a person as famous, talented and litigious as Barbra Streisand.”

The playwright delights in exploring her, shall we say, eccentric behavior. But he also sneaks in smart insights about the warping nature of celebrity and the complicated connection fans have with their idols.

This being a solo show, zippily directed by Stephen Brackett, Urie plays all the characters, including Streisand hubby James Brolin and the diva herself. Urie wisely doesn’t try to impersonate her, but tweaks his voice and body language just enough to indicate who’s saying what.

Alex lands the job after being fired from Disneyland’s Toontown for threatening a rude 8-year-old to do something unsavory with a churro. Babs turns out to be as demanding as the Mouse — “If she were a man, I’d call her a perfectionist,” Alex says. But she’s not unkind, in her own loopy way, and the two engage in warped play dates.

“How much are you asking?” she inquires of a doll — which, obviously, she already owns.

Tolins also works in several real-life tidbits, like the fro-yo machine in Streisand’s private mall and her desire to make a new movie version of “Gypsy.”

In lesser hands, “Buyer & Cellar” could skid into Internet-type irony. But Urie’s innate likability defuses any danger of bitchiness, and Tolins avoids callow jabs.

“I don’t want to be a cynic,” Alex tells his boyfriend, Barry. “I don’t want to spend my life as a less talented person making fun of more talented people.”

For a made-up story, “Buyer & Cellar” somehow gets to the core of the Barbra myth — the way she is.