Nissan's Infiniti Q45 has latest in onboard electronics, with navigation, audio and climate systems run through central screen (M)

Navigating the Navigation Aids

First articles in series None of the Above focuses on educational testing industry's failures; industry is coming off its three most problem-plagued years; its scoring errors have affected millions of students who took standardized proficiency tests in at least 20 states; review of recent mistakes and interviews with over 120 people involved suggest industry cannot guarantee error-free high-speed testing at time when Pres Bush is proposing 50 percent in tiny industry's workload; table; photos (L)

Right Answer, Wrong Score: Test Flaws Take Toll

Peter Passell Behind the Wheel column assesses Infiniti Q45, redesigned luxury car from Nissan Motor Co; photos; table of data on competing models (M)

BEHIND THE WHEEL/2002 Infiniti Q45; Once Again, a Q-Ship That Makes Waves

Felicia Lee Coping column on popularity of mules, backless, strapless platform shoes, among women in New York City this spring; drawing (M)

Getting on Board The Mule Train

Point Given wins Preakness Stakes; photos (M)0

Sweet Redemption for Point Given as Monarchos Falters

Jim Rasenberger article on search for great-great-grandfather, Johann Carl Heinrich Rasenberger, who came to New York City 150 years ago, changed his first name to Charles and opened music store on Avenue A, which eventually led to meeting with his second-cousin, Joe, a New York City mounted police officer; photos (L)

Searching for Charles

carter's plan: get a degree, and then get a vic

Carter's Plan: Get a Degree, And Then Get A Victory

Pres George W Bush's economic team has set in motion many of biggest items on his agenda in its four months on the job; conservatives like team's focus on smaller government, deregulation and individual responsibility; Bush's ideological opponents say team's approach is fiscally irresponsible, a payoff to its corporate patrons and an effort to repackage right-wing policies in centrist guise; even some of harshest critics are impressed by team's discipline and political touch and its nimbleness in turning events to its own favor; lead player for now appears to be Lawrence B Lindsey, director of National Economic Council; others on team are Treasury Sec Paul H O'Neill, Mitchell E Daniels Jr, director of Office of Management and Budget, Robert B Zoellick, trade representative, R Glenn Hubbard, chairman of Council of Economic Advisers, Josh Bolten, Deputy White House chief of staff, and John B Taylor, nominee for under secretary of Treasury for international affairs; photos (M)

Team Bush: Partisan but Nimble

Planned College of Cardinals consistory, first since 1994, will bring together all 134 men under 80 who are eligible to vote in papal conclave; gives Pope John Paul II's advisers chance to campaign, delicately, to succeed him; possible contenders noted; photos (M)

Cardinals Campaign, Very Delicately, for Pope

FINALLY, the folks who select nominees for the Tony Awards have a few worthy contenders in the best original score category, which has tended to be an embarrassment ever since Broadway was occupied by British invaders and Disney investors. The goal each year is to choose at least four scores for consideration. But even the Tony nominating committee has its pride. In 1989 the offerings were so pathetic that the categories of best original score and best book for a musical were eliminated. Then there was 1995, when an award-by-default was given to the sole nominee for best original score, ''Sunset Boulevard,'' with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Don Black and Christopher Hampton.     This year's nominees (the awards will be presented on June 3 at Radio City Music Hall) include ''The Producers,'' the megahit at the St. James Theater with a surprisingly deft and zingingly humorous score by Mel Brooks, as well as ''The Full Monty,'' a solid and winning entertainment with a poppish, pleasing score by David Yazbek at the Eugene O'Neill. Both Mr. Brooks and Mr. Yazbek were expected nominees, as was Edward Kleban, posthumously, for ''A Class Act,'' a plucky and disarming show at the Ambassador about the frustrations and fleeting triumph of a beloved Broadway denizen, Kleban himself, who died in 1987. But ''A Class Act'' does not exactly have an original musical score. The book, by Lonny Price (who also directs and stars) and Linda Kline, was constructed around existing Kleban songs that were not intended to go together.    Though none of these three scores represents a significant advancement in the genre, all are in the tried and true tradition of the musical, where the whole idea has been to tell the story through songs that combine words and music in felicitous, clever, surprising and, when called for, touching ways. There is still plenty of high-minded schlock on Broadway, which the Tony nominating committee feels compelled to take seriously: witness the final best-score nomination, for ''Jane Eyre,'' at the Brooks Atkinson, with music by Paul Gordon and lyrics by Mr. Gordon and John Caird -- that is, if you can call inept and gaggingly banal lines like ''Forgiveness is the mightiest sword/ Forgiveness of those you hate will be your highest reward'' a musical-theater song lyric. Roll over, Frank Loesser.    What's refreshing, perhaps even a breakthrough in a backward-looking sort of way, is that the scores for ''The Producers'' and ''The Full Monty'' sound as if the last 25 years of pseudo-operatic spectacle had never happened. For that alone, each score deserves grateful cheers from die-hard devotees of the musical and awards galore next month. (The first hour of the Tony show will be broadcast from 8 to 9 P.M. on PBS and the following two hours on CBS.)     As these shows suggest, perhaps one way to salvage the Broadway musical genre is to go back a couple of decades and start over. Of course, all through this bleak period there have been holdouts trying to maintain the tradition, gifted composer-lyricists as different in style as William Finn, Jonathan Larson, Adam Guettel and Jason Robert Brown.  And then there is Stephen Sondheim, the living master, an innovator who knows his roots.     No matter how musically complex and linguistically ingenious his lyrics, no matter how psychologically rich his storytelling, all his scores are based in the words-and-music heritage of the musical. On some level, every Sondheim score pays homage to older genres and styles of musical theater. Of some two dozen songs in ''Follies,'' a nominee for best revival at the Belasco, a good half are elegantly rendered pastiche songs that evoke, with clear affection and a twist of irony, a virtual catalog of old Broadway song types.    In a way, ''The Producers'' is a pastiche score too. But Mr. Brooks's attitude is unblinkingly satirical, with just a twist of affection. Mr. Brooks is a brilliant comic, not a brilliant songwriter, and he knows it. His self-confessed compositional method is to plunk out tunes at the piano to go with his witty lyrics, then hum them into a tape recorder, give the tapes to a musicologist friend to transcribe into notation, and hand the sketches to his arranger, Glen Kelly. He may not be a trained musician, but he has sure musical instincts and a keen ear for imitating styles.    If you go out whistling the tunes, it's because they are like many tunes you've heard already. True, the songs are generic. But that's the whole point. Though Mr. Brooks satirizes everything from dirty old ladies to storm-trooping Nazis, his main target is the Broadway musical itself. Each number is a thinly veiled sendup of some musical song type.    The first ensemble number, ''Opening Night,'' is a Brooksian takeoff on rousing curtain-raisers like Cole Porter's ''Another Op'nin', Another Show.'' The twist is that our hero, Max Bialystock, true to form, has produced another flop. The lyrics have a borscht belt hilarity. When the first-nighters sing of Bialystock, ''The songs were rotten, the book was stinkin'/ What he did to Shakespeare, Booth did to Lincoln!,'' the joke is answered with a nasal blast of brass from the orchestra pit, just the way a drum-and-cymbal riff used to alert a Catskills audience that the stand-up comic had just delivered the punch line.    WHEN Nathan Lane, the mesmerizing Bialystock, leads the chorus of workmen, bag ladies and bums in ''The King of Broadway,'' he sounds like some transplanted Tevye from ''Fiddler on the Roof'' encouraging his people with a minorish, heavy-footed Hebraic folk song to uphold ''Tradition.'' Mr. Lane's tour de force, ''Betrayed,'' a hyperkinetic soliloquy in which he recounts the indignities he has suffered and recaps the entire plot of the show in five minutes flat, could be taken as a sendup of ''Rose's Turn'' from ''Gypsy.''     Many critics have pointed out that underlying Mr. Brooks's withering satire is a tenderness for his characters and an unjaded infatuation with the very musical forms he is satirizing. That tenderness is embedded in the music, though the audience might miss it were it not for the performance of Matthew Broderick, whose Leo Bloom has an apt neurotic hysteria, punctuated with bouts of light-on-the-feet bravado.    As he proved in the revival of ''How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,'' Mr. Broderick is a lovely and articulate singer. His words are delivered with naturalness and clarity, like a gift to his listeners. He has an actor's voice, but his pitch is unfailing and his sound rich, slightly throbbing and touched with poignancy. So when he sings Mr. Brooks's homage to the soft-shoe song-and-dance number, ''I Wanna Be a Producer,'' the effect is funny yet sweet. And when at Bialystock's trial he begins '' 'Til Him,'' a takeoff on the sentimental Broadway love song, his singing is so unaffected and honest, you darn near get misty-eyed. That is, until the jurors, a chorus of old biddies, break into mock-angelic ''ah-ah'' refrains.    The ''Springtime for Hitler'' production number of the show within the show is a gleeful skewering of the overproduced, gaudy, tasteless Broadway production number, though the zany excesses here hardly exceed what you see every season on Broadway. If you don't believe this, check out the crude, slick and numbingly aggressive dance chorus production numbers in ''Seussical'' at the Richard Rodgers.    Mr. Brooks and his co-author, Thomas Meehan, realize that the very idea of ''Springtime for Hitler'' will offend some people. But wasn't the real Hitler, in the most warped way imaginable, like the self-made star of some Continental production number, with gargantuan sets, pompously silly costumes, marching choristers and cheering throngs who fell for it? Perhaps Mr. Brooks and the director Susan Stroman are showing us a way to laugh at the element of stupid Broadway extravaganza in the Nazi regime.     Though Mr. Yazbek is an experienced writer of pop songs, he had never written a score for a musical when Terrence McNally, who wrote the book for ''The Full Monty,'' and the producer Lindsay Law persuaded him to try. In adapting the 1997 English movie of the same name, they had a clear conception of the type of show they wanted: an energetic, knockabout, uplifting story of laid-off steelworkers in Buffalo. They didn't want searching ballads and fancy ensembles.     Mr. Yazbek's genial, gyrating, rockish musical voice, they thought, was just right. The score he gave them fits the mood and serves the purpose. His lyrics drive the songs, and for the most part the words have a raunchy, albeit heavy-handed, charm. As Jerry (the likable Patrick Wilson) tries to persuade his unemployed pals to earn some cash by dancing at a local male strip joint, he sings:      You're a man and that's a bonus    'Cause when you're swinging your cojones    You'll show 'em what testosterone is --     'Cause you're a boot-wearin', beer-drinking, Chevy-driving man.      O.K., it's not Dorothy Fields. But, sung over an electric-bass rock riff and biting brass chords, it does the job.     Of course, there are a lot of rock riffs and formulaic melodic licks in Mr. Yazbek's songs. But there are also some clever numbers, like ''Big Black Man,'' a nod to Little Richard that provides the amazing Andr&#233; De Shields with an outlet for his raspy voice and brilliant physical comedy.    In the end, Mr. Yazbek did write a few soulful ballads, and they are the weak patches of the score. ''You Rule My World,'' for instance, has a trite tune and sentimental lyrics. But at least you feel that in this show a songwriter is using words and music to tell the story and drive the action. It's a refreshing break from the pretentiousness in scores of the ''Les Miz'' and ''Miss Saigon'' ilk, like ''Jane Eyre,'' with its pseudo recitative, soupy harmonic palette and inflated melodic posturings.    Things have been bad for the musical on Broadway for so long that Mr. Yazbek's absence from the scene may have actually helped him. It's as if he showed up with his score and said: ''So, you needed, what, 12 or so songs? Here they are. I think they're pretty good. Is there anything else? Am I missing something?''    Ed Kleban, the hero of ''A Class Act,'' was a composer and lyricist. But until this musical about his life came along, he was known by the public almost exclusively as the lyricist for ''A Chorus Line.'' As the show relates, Kleban was reluctant to accept the job of writing lyrics for the composer Marvin Hamlisch, who had already been tapped for the music. Even after the success of ''A Chorus Line,'' Kleban could not get his own scores successfully produced. A terrible collaborator in a field where collaboration is all, he died of cancer at 48, frustrated and still feisty, and Mr. Price captures his ticks, twitches and phobias. (How did a man afraid of elevators survive in Manhattan?)     The book weaves Kleban's songs, sometimes with the stitches showing, into the narrative of his life. Some songs are little gems, like ''Better,'' which Barbra Streisand recorded, then decided not to include in an album, and which Mr. Sondheim, in a New York Times Magazine interview last year, included in a long list of songs he wished he had written. There's snappy, easygoing wordplay in the lyrics:    ''I've been fat/ I've been thin/  Thin is better/ I've been out/ I've been in/ In is better.''    And later: ''I've been healthy and in pain/ Pain is reason to complain/ Ask someone who's been insane/ Sane is better.''    The tune is catchy; the rhythmic lift is jaunty. It's perfect.    ''Paris Through the Window'' is a nostalgic and wonderfully precise youthful remembrance of driving through the streets of that romantic city. In the show, Mr. Price, as Ed, sings the song in the BMI Musical Theater Workshop, founded by Lehman Engel. Songwriters who still attend that workshop in New York should get a kick out of seeing it depicted so amusingly here.    At one point, when Kleban complains to Sophie, his ex-girlfriend, that producers seem interested only in his lyrics, she says, trying to encourage him to accept their offers, ''Well, maybe your music isn't as good as your lyrics.'' He never forgives her.    She was right. The lyrics are better. But in rendering Kleban's story, the show reminds us of a truth about musical theater: Yes, ideally, music and words should have equal richness and quality; but if the balance is off, better to have good words and functional music than the other way around. That's the nature of the genre.    So who will win the best original score award? The astonishing success of ''The Producers'' may sweep Mr. Brooks, who can't notate his own songs, to victory. If the Tony voters want to parcel out at least some awards to ''The Full Monty,'' they may go with Mr. Yazbek. Then again, to honor an unsung hero, they may give the award to Kleban. Mr. Gordon and Mr. Caird need not prepare an acceptance speech.    Of course, by excluding Off Broadway work from contention, the Tony Awards have hurt the cause of the musical. There is new talent out there, songwriters steeped in the tradition yet with fresh voices and ideas, all waiting for a chance, like Mr. Guettel, Mr. Brown, Andrew Lippa and Jeanine Tesori. But who will take a chance on them when a musical has to support an expensive Broadway theater and attract busloads of suburbanites for months just to earn back investments? If the Broadway musical is saved, it will not be Broadway that saves it. It will be Off Broadway, or experimental groups, regional theaters, even opera companies, where musical-theater works are being developed.     For now, though, thanks to a funny man, a pop songwriter and a dead lyricist, Broadway is giving credibility to the best original score category of the Tony Awards.  

They Do Write 'Em Like They Used To

Out There report on Japanese men who fantasize about comely young women who adorn trade shows, following them around from show to show to snap photos; photo (M)

OUT THERE -- Tokyo; Part-Time Paparazzi in Search of Dream Girls

Cherry Tree Association, Bronx nonprofit community group, offers exhibition on city of future, featuring solar, wind and fuel-cell technology (M)

POSTINGS: Exhibit in Bronx on Energy Conservation; A Model City Of the Future

Amazon.com reveals steps it is taking to cut costs and raise revenue now that it has realized its ambitions for rapid growth; new emphasis on profitability is acknowledgment of skeptics' complaints that its operations are complicated, expensive and inefficient; Lyn Blake, vice president, and Russell Allgor, who has developed an 800,000-equation computer model of company's spawling operation, lead effort; among elements of plan are eliminating unprofitable items, improving margin, reducing warehouse errors, having other companies stock, ship and sell some of its products, and cutting customer service costs; photos of Blake and Allgor and Jeff Bezos, Amazon's founder (L)

Listen Up! It's Time for a Profit; A Front-Row Seat as Amazon Gets Serious

Confidential Bush administration review reportedly recommends United States not accept draft accord to enforce 1972 treaty banning germ weapons; accord, known as protocol, sets steps to monitor ban; treaty, which bars development, production and possession of biological arms lacks means of verifying compliance; Bush team found protocol would not stop cheating and that deficiencies could not be remedied by negotiating deadline; review, certain to distress allies, is emerging as sensitive diplomatic problem; table of biological weapons banned under treaty (M)

U.S. Germ Warfare Review Faults Plan on Enforcement

Oregon and Missouri, followed more tentatively by several other states, have begun comprehensive effort to remold prison inmates to cut recidivism, requiring them to work, study or undergo drug and other treatment sessions full time; programs represent return to old notion of rehabilitating prisoners, notion largely abandoned decades ago in most state prison systems; Oregon programs prepare inmates for well-paid jobs, with many inmates now leaving prison with printed resume; photos (M)

Inmate Rehabilitation Returns as Prison Goal

Tobias Meyer, 38-year-old star auctioneer for Sotheby's, combines poise at rostrum with business smarts and cocktail-party diplomacy in his role as 'James Bond' of art auction world; photos (M)

That Cool, That Suit: Sotheby's 007

Alex Berenson column reports that Jonathan Hakala has devised intriguing if flawed plan to let market, rather than Federal Reserve, set short-term interest rates; graph (M)

Setting Rates By the Numbers

Arab League foreign ministers, outraged by Israeli use of fighter jets to attack Palestinian positions in West Bank, say they are severing all political contacts with Israel until violence stops; move halts Egyptian-Jordanian effort to mediate truce in conflict, leaving United States as only remaining party that can engage both sides (M)

Arabs to Sever Political Contacts In Protest Against Israeli Tactics

SOME people are just fair game for being picked on and put down: lawyers, politicians, journalists, mothers-in-law and, now, bullies. These days, everybody is ganging up on bullies, blaming them for all that ails us.    Bullies and their taunting, arrogant ways are said to have been the driving force behind the student shootings at Columbine and Santana High Schools. Young bullies supposedly grow into sociopaths, angry drunks, wife abusers or maybe mayors of major East Coast cities.  

Ideas & Trends: The Sandbox; Bully for You: Why Push Comes to Shove

Construction is finally under way on AOL Time Warner Center on Columbus Circle; $1.7 billion complex will include headquarters and studios of the media conglomerate, rental office and retail space, hotel, residences and music venues; drawings; photo (L)

A New Colossus Begins to Rise

Article on new wave of style-fixated brides, nicknamed 'bridezillas,' who take fussiness to new levels, obsessing more about width of flower petals and bridesmaids' hair colors than about actual marriage to their betrothed; photos (M)

Attack of Bridezilla: Demanding Perfection Before 'I Do'

New Jersey Devils defeat Pittsburgh Penguins, 5-0, to take 3-1 lead in playoff series; table; photos (M)0

Composure and Brodeur Help the Devils Call All the Shots

IN every room at the Holiday Inn Campus in Eau Claire, Wis., a sign implores guests to preserve energy by re-using their towels. But Terri Mertz, the hotel's general manager, said that typically guests in no more than five rooms (out of 137) do so.    ''People probably think, 'I'm at a hotel, so they can pay for my towels,' '' Ms. Mertz said.  

Ideas & Trends: Power Politics; Looking to Win The Energy Issue

Edward and Susie Elson bought a one-bedroom in their building to house visiting friends, and got their son Harry, an architect, to design it. By Trish Hall   4

Habitats/Park Ave. and 58th; An Apartment For Guests

Kalian Companies will construct 158 condominium town houses and apartments at Half Moon Bay in Croton-on-Hudson, NY; drawing (M)

May 20, 2001

Headlines from May 20, 2001

Navigating the Navigation Aids

Right Answer, Wrong Score: Test Flaws Take Toll

BEHIND THE WHEEL/2002 Infiniti Q45; Once Again, a Q-Ship That Makes Waves

Getting on Board The Mule Train

Sweet Redemption for Point Given as Monarchos Falters

Billboard 200

Survivor

All For You

Now 6

Set This Circus Down

Trouble In Shangri-La

Notable Deaths

Historical Context for May 20, 2001