So expectations are running high, along with schadenfreude at the ready from the Broadway community. And then there are the ghosts. The current show’s performers are dogged by the spirits of their cinematic predecessors, and I’m happy to report that with one or two exceptions the live actors succeed in pushing those specters into the wings. At a few inspired moments, the present even shoves the past all the way out the stage door.

Christopher Fitzgerald re-imagines and rejuvenates Igor (pronounced Eye-gor), turning this archetypal sidekick/stooge into a droll, animated, in-the-moment presence. Whether he’s distracting suspicious villagers from the newly reanimated monster’s howls by crooning the tune to the new dance sensation, “Transylvania Mania,” or welcoming Frederick to town with the vaudeville-style buddy song “Together Again,” Fitzgerald infuses Igor with his own brand of madcap while respecting the path laid down by the late Marty Feldman.

Musical comedy pro Sutton Foster puts her own tantalizing, wide-eyed stamp on Inga, extending Teri Garr’s “Would you like to have a roll in the hay?” line into a cleverly staged number titled, yes, “Roll in the Hay.” Her grip on Inga’s mittel-European accent slips about as often as she shows off her fabulous legs, high-kicking and doing a serious split on the lab’s operating table, but who cares? As in Thoroughly Modern Millie and The Drowsy Chaperone, she seemingly effortlessly transmits her pleasure in performing directly to the audience.

Shuler Hensley’s monster, Andrea Martin’s Frau Blucher and Fred Applegate’s Inspector Kemp didn’t make me forget Peter Boyle, Cloris Leachman, or Kenneth Mars, but their expert timing and command of the stage made me smile. Martin turned one triumphant Leachman line, “He vas my boyfriend!”, into a Weimar-style he-done-me-wrong song that mixed the best of Marlene Dietrich and Lotte Lenya. Hensley acquitted himself well in “Puttin’ on the Ritz,” no mean feat in shoes with six-inch soles, and transformed effectively into a charmingly articulate soul in the play’s final few minutes. Applegate is merely serviceable as the poseable action figure Kemp, but he really does himself proud as the schlemiel blind hermit, successfully channeling Mammy-praising Al Jolson with his longing song, “Please Send Me Someone.”

Roger Bart, in the marathon part of Frederick, shows off his considerable musical comedy skills early and often, beginning with the Gilbert-and-Sullivan-speed patter in his paean to his most-used organ, “The Brain.” He also uses his vocal trademark, a sudden shift to his upper register when exasperated beyond endurance.

Bart’s tightrope walk is especially tricky. As the nominally sane person surrounded by kooks, creeps and crazies, he must keep the plot moving forward while only gradually revealing his own megalomania — the arrogance that allows him to create “his” monster even when he knows how very dangerous that can be. If he isn’t yet hitting every note on that scale, he’s playing a pleasant enough tune.