From 1970 to 1973, composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim and director Harold Prince masterminded a trio of landmark musicals that focused largely on marriages – their complexities, their frustrations, and their fragility. The first two, “Company” and “Follies,” are often discussed together since they share an edgy, contemporary setting with decidedly contemporary characters. 

I’ve rarely heard “A Little Night Music” grouped with those two.

Maybe it’s because of the waltz-infused music, the Swedish setting and/or the circa-1900 setting. Or maybe it seems to stand alone in the Sondheim cannon because it actually produced a hit song, the oft-recorded “Send in the Clowns.”Still, the bonds of marriage are at the center of the musical, which was adapted by Hugh Wheeler from the Ingmar Bergman film “Smiles of a Summer Night.”

In it, Fredrik Egerman is in a physicality-free marriage with much-younger Anne but still pines for actress Desiree Armfeldt, who is in the midst of an affair with Count Carl-Magnus whose wife, Countess Charlotte, is well aware of his dalliances.

The wry romance – even the wise matriarch, Madame Armfeldt, sings of her multiple liaisons and the goods acquired from them – requires a production that trusts its audience. This isn’t a world where virginal women help put wayward men on the proper path. It’s the story of middle-aged love, connections missed, and second chances, focused on people who have experienced joys and sorrows from their past relationships that have had mixed ratios of love, sex and romance. A good production – and the one being offered at the Marriott Theatre in Lincolnshire, Illinois is a very good one – understands this, casting, designing and directing the piece accordingly. 

It’s anchored by Alexandra Silber as Desiree. She was actually a key reason I made the trek to catch this production, having been delighted by her work in the streamed BBC Proms concert production of “Kiss Me Kate.” While both characters are actresses, her Desiree is very different from her Lilli Vanessi. In Desiree, Silber manages to show not just the actress and the lover but also the daughter and the mother in her. We have to buy a woman who would have a casual affair with a Count who she knows is a buffoon and to still care about a woman who would hit the road for extensive tours while leaving her daughter in the care of her mother. (Okay, and her mother’s servants.) I bought her complexity and was rooting for her – even if her rueful “Send in the Clowns” felt a bit over emotional. 

I’ll write that off, though, as a need to underline things a bit for a fairly energy-free Sunday audience. 

Equally strong, but less central, is Madison Uphoff, now on my actresses-to-watch list, as the maid, Petra. Admittedly, “The Miller’s Son” is a top-10 Sondheim song for me, but I’ve seen it wrecked in an earlier production by an actress who turned it into what felt like an “American Idol” audition. Uphoff understands that the song isn’t just a second-act knockout song by a supporting character. It’s an extension of the person who has been on the periphery since the opening of the show observing, processing, and judging. At the same time, the song is its own mini-play in which Petra experiences a range of emotions and degrees of urgency, not just stating a philosophy but convincing herself of it. It’s a masterful performance but Uphoff never lets her ego transform it from a character number into an actress show-off piece. 

As Anne, Addie Morales turns what could be a one-note character into a believable, naive young woman who hasn’t quite grasped – until she does – what’s missing when a marriage involves two people with very different expectations. For  “A Little Night Music,” we need to feel that a no-fault mistake has been made in her pairing with Fredrik. But it’s a mistake nonetheless. And Morales artfully keeps Anne from being simply a joke to be dealt with rather than a woman sorting out her own needs and desires. 

And the production also benefits from Carmen Roman and Olivia Grace and grandmother and granddaughter – although Roman’s strength makes the final moments of the piece a bit difficult to buy. No spoiler. 

The father and son of Andrew Samonksy’s Fredrik and Eldon Warner-Soriano’s Henrik both gained strength as the show went on, Samonksy finding everyman humor and Warner-Soriano smartly playing Henrik’s self-loathing conflicts. 

Less effective but not in a debilitating way were Alan H. Green’s one-note Count and Veronica Garza’s Countess, who played the déclassé without first establishing the classé. She was in fine voice, however, for “Every Day a Little Death.”

Director Nick Bowling and the design team made the in-the-round space feel like the show’s national habitat. 

While frequent productions of “Sweeney Todd” and “Into the Woods” continue to dot the theatrical landscape, “A Little Night Music” is less likely to show up at your local professional, community or college theater. It’s a difficult show to pull off effectively. That the Marriott team has done it so effectively – and trusted its audience with it – is a cause for applause.