Lauren Anderson wields cumbersome costumes and entendres as the "Headlights" emcee. The "Car Wash" in "Headlights & Tailpipes" is sure to end up topless, but "Starsky & Hutch" fans will have to settle for a cameo by their Gran Torino.

When Jeff Kutash is involved in a Las Vegas show, what's good for me may not be what's good for you.

If you consider yourself an average consumer of Las Vegas entertainment, looking for the innocuous, time-wasting variety revue that used to be the norm here, "Headlights & Tailpipes" fills the bill just fine.

But producer Kutash knows I expect more from him. He's my go-to guy for bad taste, sort of the John Waters-meets-Ed Wood of Vegas entertainment. When Kutash is on fire, he gives us musclemen wrestling frozen alligators, "Phantom of the Opera" on ice or a Tom Jones impersonator with an overstuffed crotch singing "America the Beautiful" in front of the Stars and Stripes (all past or present features of Kutash's masterwork, "Splash").

The new revue at the Stardust offers the promising formula of cars, bikes and babes. Anything with a Bigfoot truck, mini choppers and BMX bicycles sounded like the perfect vehicle for Kutash to create his own Sistine Chapel. So the big surprise here is that the whole thing unfolds slowly with a wavering energy level, and just doesn't go far enough over the top.

Take the bikini car wash sequence. The dancers quickly pop their tops, a good start reminiscent of the fading glory days of the late-'70s drive-ins. The music is the actual song "Car Wash" -- a wee bit obvious, but right for the era.

Here comes the "Starsky & Hutch" Gran Torino. Now we're talkin'... Out of it pop some gals in Daisy Duke shorts. Oh, I get it: "When two TV shows collide." Good job, Jeff. Bad guys are gonna come and rob the car wash, and then ...

It's on to the next scene. What? No Starsky? No Hutch? No Bo and Luke? Kutash falls short of the impossible standards to which I hold him.

Same with a scene that promises to be an homage to the movie "The Road Warrior." The big stage at the Stardust fills up with motorcycle trikes and a dune buggy, and showgirls with tattered bikinis and wigs of bright orange and blue. But just as we're starting to savor the moment, it all melts away as the stage is turned over to a quartet of BMX stunt riders. "Headlights" would be smart to reconfigure its marketing, playing up the fact that the Stardust stage lends itself to a more action-packed girlie show than cabaret revues such as "Crazy Girls" or "Fantasy." The old passarella, or curved ramp, from the "Lido de Paris" days makes a perfect track through the room for two-wheelers revving to "Born to Be Wild."

The rain curtain that left Wayne Newton's cake out in the rain is recycled for the sexiest number, between a motorcycle cop (Willie Hulett) and the gal (Ruthie Gastineau) he was maybe going to ticket.

The rest of it's fairly demure, including the sweet-seeming Playmate, Lauren Anderson. She charms us with her willingness to tackle an uncomfortable emcee's role, spewing banter about the "dangerous curves ahead" and how this will "get your motor running."

The specialty acts are suitably offbeat, including married comedians Lonesome Dave (Conrades) and Ludo Vika, who perform their cowboy- and Latin-comedy segments separately and then do a skit together. The other is one Venesa Talor, star of "Femalien" and the whip-cracking singer of two dirty novelty tunes, one of them a kiss-off to Hugh Hefner because he didn't make her a Playmate.

Her segment is a nice jolt to the predictable flow of things. The only other piece to fulfil its true Kutashian promise is the "Salute to Pimps," where Curtis Mayfield's "Superfly" theme seques into this year's Oscar-winning "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp."

As the pimp character did his break-dancing thing onstage, I briefly got a chill that reminded me of Kutash at his best. All I wanted was more.