P G Wodehouse

Although the "Lollapalooza" festival will come around later in the summer to entice the edgy, the musical season opened perfectly this past weekend with the "Troubadours of Folk" festival, a traditionalist alternative to the alternative, offering among its many attractions an atmosphere so infectiously laid-back they could've called it Lollygag-ooza.

I think it was very considerate of Jerry Seinfeld to save his two worst episodes for last. It makes it much easier for his fans to deal with their sense of abandonment. There is something, after all, to be said for leaving 'em wanting less.BURT PRELUTSKY North Hills There was no better tribute to the impact of "Seinfeld" than what Brian Lowry reported ("Across U.S. and Beyond, Fans Bid 'Seinfeld' Farewell," May 15): The L.A. Department of Water and Power conducted a spot check during commercials and found that water usage increased by 10% as the huge viewing audience went to the bathroom simultaneously.

The American musical comedy and the American musical theater are two separate entities--but Jerome Kern was a pioneer in both forms. So says Sylvia Fine Kaye, the wife of Danny Kaye, who also is a producer, writer, composer, lyricist and teacher--and who produced, wrote and hosts "Musical Comedy Tonight III," to air on PBS Friday (8 p.m. on Channel 24, 9 p.m. on Channels 28 and 15).

Some people say that impending nuclear war is the issue of the 20th Century. For P. G. Wodehouse, who wrote from 1901 until his death at 93 in 1975, the real issues are: --Will Bertram Wooster's aunt really deny him the food of her chef, Anatole ("God's gift to gastronomic juices"), if Bertie refuses to tap-dance and sing "Sonny Boy" in public?

In the 19th Century, the work of playwright Victorien Sardou was immensely popular in France and England. By the 20th Century, his realistic bourgeois dramas became better known as a symbol of everything that was wrong with the old school of drama. George Bernard Shaw mocked Sardou's work, and that of others in his vein, by referring to them as examples of "Sardoodledum." Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnar poked fun of Sardou in his own plays. One of them, adapted by P.G.

Cole Porter's "Anything Goes" has a title that really fits. The story about a shipwreck of society folks was originally written by Guy Bolton and P. G. Wodehouse. It was revised by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse in 1934 when a real shipwreck bled the humor from the story. It then became the tale about a broke stockbroker who stows away on a luxury boat to win his girl back from her wealthy English fiancee. The score changed with the text and circumstance.

Three cheers for "Leave It to Jane." Well, two. Your true "Jane"-ite demands perfection, and George Schaefer's revival for Musical Comedy/L.A. falls short of that. But compared to "The Boys From Syracuse," the company's opening show at the James A. Doolittle Theatre, it's divine. Let's say that progress is being made. Students of the American musical should certainly not miss "Jane."

A lot of us grew up, more or less, in the vicinity of Hal Linden. There he was, on the early '60s "Anything Goes" cast album as Billy Crocker, adjusting his bow tie and grinning. There he was, eight seasons on "Barney Miller," for which Linden won three Emmys as the stalwart center of a strong situation comedy. Even in less interesting ventures, Linden has proven a genial, versatile, classy presence.

The Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for comic fiction announced its shortlist Thursday , with five novelists competing for the title of Britain's funniest author with the book that "best captures the comic spirit of P.G. Wodehouse," the author of, among many others, the "Jeeves and Wooster" novels.  "This is one of the strongest shortlists I have seen," said judge and Everyman's Library publisher David Campbell. "All five novels are truly brilliantly funny. " Notably absent from the list of finalists this year was perennial British prize-winner Hilary Mantel.