Cynthia Hopkins in "Accidental Nostalgia." Click photo for larger image. 'Accidental Nostalgia' Where: Warhol Museum Off the Wall series, at New Hazlett Theater, North Side. When: Sat.. 8 p.m. Tickets: $18; members and students $15; 412-237-8300. Web site: For pictures and info, visit www.gloriadeluxe.com

The central figure in "Accidental Nostalgia" is a kewpie provocateur or maybe geeky madonna. She's supported lavishly by Gloria Deluxe, an alt-country/rock/folk band, and by a mighty ensemble of two busy techies who create video visuals and also dance, sing, narrate and brew coffee.

That potent central figure is author/composer/performer Cynthia Hopkins, playing Cameron Seymour (several puns in that name), a buttoned-up lecturer on "psychogenic amnesia," or is she really fugitive patricide Henrietta Bill? Whoever, it's "her" journey into an imaginative past that forms the narrative spine of Hopkins' serio-comic, three-act, 80-minute operetta.

With it, the Warhol's Off the Wall series of distinctive imported performance specials takes a quantum step, breaking away from the confines of the small platform in the Warhol's own auditorium to expand into the inviting New Hazlett Theater, a bit further down river on the North Side.

Call it the antithesis and necessary off-Cultural District corrective to the big stage, big audience touring Broadway musicals in the bigger halls on the other side of the Allegheny.

"Accidental Nostalgia" needs the Hazlett's space, coming equipped with a whole techno-rich environment of platforms, props and five projection screens of different sizes, flanked by the band on one side and the techies' lair on the other, like a cross between an airplane cockpit and an undergrad dorm.

To start, Hopkins appears in a creamy, cut-away suit, looking something between a lab assistant and a stripper, with her Louise Brooks hair accentuating the air of innocence-cum-perversity. She talks with pseudo-pedantry and maybe real seriousness about the necessity of selective amnesia, but I attended less to her talk than to the image of the trim young figure working out some ritual of self-exposure.

And she sings. Hopkins has an enticing, crystal clear and persuasive voice, and I would have happily bought the album, if it hadn't been out of stock. (You can order it at www.gloriadeluxe.com.) The main modes are lament and meditation, but there's also foot-tapping propulsion. I heard things that reminded me of the Tiger Lillies (without the falsetto), Tom Waits, Laurie Anderson and others, which is evidence that, as with the confused descriptions of an unknown language in the Sherlock Holmes story, she must be speaking in a musical language that is really all her own.

The four-person band is great, heavy on soulful strings but with a driving beat. It adds character to the action and even a spot of the spoons.

In Act 2, the lecturer lets down her hair (in every way) to journey to Georgia to explore partial memories of sexual abuse by her father. This is comic gothic noir, complete with an abandoned house, a gossipy police dispatcher, discarded diary, good ol' boy cops and frantic flight.

In Act 3, she pursues her mother to Morocco (!) and ends up encountering her father via laptop video, except he probably isn't her father after all. It all ends with an affecting diminuendo.

In a preview interview, Hopkins said if she were in the audience she'd probably focus on the techies. Every time I reminded myself of that and pulled away from her, I found Jim Findlay and Jeff Sugg, one elephantine the other wiry (I'm not sure which is which), alternating intense focus on making magic with goofy relaxation, sometimes choreographed. They love their hats. They wield crafty finger cams, as well.

The Hazlett's sharply banked seats put the audience close to all this, especially last night, when the fresh snowfall kept down the size of the crowd. For us happy few, it was a lavish treat.