Hot Feet, the new musical with songs old and new by Earth, Wind & Fire making its world premiere at the National Theater, inevitably will be compared to its juke-box-soundtrack predecessors, from the Billy Joel-driven Movin’ Out to the Beach Boys bash Good Vibrations. And while those shows are frequently derided by the theater-snob community, Hot Feet‘s curse is that it may not even connect with mainstream audiences: it lacks the guilty-pleasure infectuousness of a Mamma Mia!, and its cliché-riddled plot doesn’t even showcase its solid songbase as it could.

In a nutshell, Hot Feet, the brainchild of Earth, Wind & Fire founder Maurice White and director/choreographer Maurice Hines, is a retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Red Shoes”, with a healthy dose of A Chorus Line thrown in as well. Kalimba (Vivian Nixon, whose dance talent is undeniable but whose vocal chops are questionable) wants to be a dancer, despite the objections of her mother (Ann Duqesnay, lending starpower with her booming, rich voice and commanding presence). Kalimba manages to get cast in a show, and even falls for the choreographer, Anthony (Michael Balderrama, who’s a bit bland but can really move). Things are going great, but what she doesn’t know is that the show’s creator, Victor (Keith David, consistently transcending the dribble he’s forced to deliver, even when his mic isn’t working), has made a pact with the devil (a manic, vocally-inconsistent Allen Hidalgo), and Kalimba’s soul’s in jeopardy if she takes center stage.