Funny thing about irreverence. It can go too far, as in “Urinetown.” Or it can not go far enough. As in “Urinetown.”

The touring production of the Tony-winning Broadway smash is currently at Arizona State University’s Gammage Auditorium, and judging by opening night’s audience — which gave the show a tepid, we’re-only-standing-to-get-to-our-cars-faster ovation — there’s something about this musical comedy about a pay-to-pee dystopia that isn’t quite as refreshing as we’d been hyped into believing.

Mind you, it’s a fun show and the touring cast — including recent substitution Jeff McCarthy, who originated the role of narrator Officer Lockstock on Broadway and is returning to the role for the last six weeks of the tour — delivers some gadzooks-great performances.
But while other critics on the tour’s trail have fallen all over themselves to praise the show with half-witty pee puns (I had my own already devised before opening night: “Urine for a treat!”), I can’t help feeling that “Urinetown” is nothing more than Broadway’s first Zucker Brothers musical.

The show’s book writer, Greg Kotis, penned a musical homage to cheap gag-a-minute, flimsy-plotted Zucker flicks like “Airplane!” and “The Naked Gun.” If Broadway is your only source of entertainment, your funnybone will be sprained over such hilarious contrivances as characters speaking to the audience about the show (“This isn’t a happy musical,” Lockstock advises) and the assorted potty puns sprinkled throughout the show.

But for the rest of us, well, we’ve seen “Top Secret!” already. What we’re left with is a musical with some great songs and comic moments, but that folds in on itself so much it’s like we’re not allowed to enjoy anything with sincerity.

That’s a shame, because there’s so much to love in the story of a public bathroom worker (played by Charlie Pollock, looking a bit like the frontman for Creed) who falls in love with a girl (golden-throated comedy whiz Christiane Noll) — only to discover she’s the daughter of the greedy man whose corporation controls the pay toilets that have become the only legal whiz-game in town.

There are inspired musical spoofs and gags galore here, from a flag-waving potty revolution that’s straight out of “Les Miserables” to Lockstock’s penchant for switching from command presence to posing show queen at the drop of a downbeat. But with all the winky breaking of the fourth wall and bits like labeling the revolutionaries’ hideout with a large sign that says “Secret Hideout,” it’s hard to feel anything genuine for “Urinetown.”

Urine for a fun, solid evening of anti-theater with “Urinetown,” to be sure. Just don’t be surprised when its irreverent charm lasts as long as the average bathroom break.