It’s the world’s first Posttraumatic Stress Disorder musical.

And that’sThe Bandstand, now having its world premiere at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, New Jersey. However, everyone involved of course has high hopes that it will move 22 miles east to Broadway.

That the musical deals with such a difficult subject isn’t what makes it unsuccessful. Many musicals have tackled odd situations and proved “‘Taint what you do, it’s the way that you do it.” The writers must be applauded for pointing out that long before this horrid affliction received its official name after The Vietnam War, it was a factor from battles fought long before – which here means World War II.

Where co-librettists and co-lyricists Robert Taylor and Richard Oberacker have erred terribly is in the creation of their main character, one Donny Novitski.

It’s August, 1945, just days after Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the Japanese surrender, and Donny has come home. He saw action – too much of it, especially when his best friend was killed inches away from him.

So while everyone around him is jitterbugging and singing with blissful optimism that it’s going to be “Just Like It Was Before!” Donny isn’t as certain. He was a musical prodigy before the war, but can he now have a prodigious career?

Here’s where The Bandstand goes wrong. The authors center not on a veteran’s recovery, but focus virtually exclusively on Donny’s fervent need to Make It in Show Business. He’s bitter about his betters, too. (Perhaps his observation that Frank Sinatra often sang flat should have been dropped at least for Millburn; the New Jersey audience that still takes pride in Ol’ Blue Eyes was not amused.)

The writers also wind up making the same mistake, although not as egregiously, that Earl Mac Rauch and Mardik Martin did with Robert De Niro’s Jimmy Doyle in New York, New York. We’re supposed to like our “hero” because he’s single-minded, utterly driven to get what he wants and won’t take no for an answer. All four authors didn’t see that there’s a difference between being strong and coming on too strong.

You might say the same of the “obnoxious and disliked” John Adams in 1776, but his goals are far loftier. Every American wants Adams to succeed in establishing the United States; how significant is a band’s winning a contest so that it can appear in an MGM musical movie?

Alas, that’s all that the writers see at stake here when there’s really so much more. We stop caring whether or not Donny wins and would actually like to see the egomaniac lose so that he can be taken down a peg.

Donny’s told “If you’re going to be a bandleader, you’re going to have to learn how to talk to people” … “Parents should warn their kids about people like you” … “You have a habit of saying things the wrong way.” These lines pointedly show that the writers know they’ve created an unlikeable individual but they expect us to accept and embrace him simply because he’s their leading character. Unfortunately, it takes much more than that for an audience to care.

Those three observations are said by Julia, the widow of Donny’s Army buddy. Although we should feel that Donny genuinely wants to help Julia in moving on past the tragedy, we see through him: Donny mostly wants to land an attractive girl singer for his band and Julia will do.

For Julia does sing, albeit only on Sundays at Our Lady of Mercy Church. Leave it to the insensitive Donny, however, to bring her one night to where his band is playing and put her on the spot to sing. Whether Julia would like to or not is irrelevant to him; it’s all about what he wants. Donny simply thinks of people as tools in a box, just ready to be taken out when he needs them.

So when Julia wavers on being a permanent band member, Donny shouldn’t just self-absorbedly be worried about himself; here’s his chance to be tender and caring to this woman who has suffered a tremendous loss.

That Donny sets Julia’s poems to music is a good idea; now they’re collaborating on a different level. Still, there’s no reason why should Julia love him (which, of course, is one inevitable issue here). Given that Donny is – well, obnoxious and disliked — there’s a good chance that the best we’ll get is Love By Association – meaning that Julia will fall in “love” with a man because he once knew her now-dead husband.

True, she does ask “What’s the harm in being needed now?” Actually, there’s quite a bit of harm if the need is misplaced and comes from a pushy, self-centered and never-willing-to-compromise Donny.

A better scenario would have had Julie love Donny because he was worth loving, but this is not the person that the writers have created. At one point Donny even admits that he’s “putting on a front.” So where’s the real Donny? That’s the person we have to get to know – and Julia has to get to love. Right now, she’s too much good for him.

Don’t blame Corey Cott, who’s attractive, dynamic and an excellent song ‘n’ dance man. He’s simply playing the script and score that he was given, and despite everything, he’s doing superbly well. The one time that Cott is given a chance to soften the character through an effective speech about wartime atrocities, he does so splendidly.

The writers actually do a better job of getting sympathy for the other members of the band. Arguably best of all is Joe Carroll as the shell- shocked drummer Johnny. Needless to say, he doesn’t get nearly as many lines, songs or moments as our anti-hero, but he makes quite an impact with a few halting remarks.

So the authors have proved with just a few words that they’re capable of creating a character with whom we can give our hearts and concern. Here’s hoping that they can make the necessary adjustments to Donny, too. Can’t he want to succeed so he can give some money to Julia to make life for her and her mother easier?

Perhaps the writers were afraid of devolving into the cliché of Doing It for the Dead Buddy. Ah, but Taylor and Oberacker might have remembered that many women did suddenly lose their reasonably high- paying jobs after the war (something that the women could bring up in a minor-key in “Just Like It Was Before”). If the writers established that women who had been making a living for the last four years were suddenly now penniless out-of-work widows, we’d sympathize more than we do now where finances are never an issue.

Even without those complications, Laura Osnes – the most talented and appealing Broadway actress to emerge in the last decade – is lovely and completely successful as Julia. Making a meddlesome mother endearing isn’t easy, but Beth Leavel has no problem achieving it.

Donny and his band take a stand in The Bandstand. It leads to a sharp turn of events that even the most seasoned theatergoer won’t be able to predict. (He might well, however, foresee the romantic fate awaiting Donny and Julia.) And yet, despite the clever twist, in real life the powers-that-be would have had an option that would have awkwardly but easily subverted the band’s chance for success.

On David Korins’ boring unit set, Andy Blankenbuehler’s direction is whisk-broom fast. Although his choreography cannot be called innovative, it is right for the period – -which is much more than can be said for Paloma Young’s costumes.

The most remarkable aspect of The Bandstand is one that we rarely find in musicals about musicians. Who would have expected that all six would be able to play their own instruments? Kudos to Carroll, bassist Brandon J. Ellis, saxist James Nathan Hopkins, trombonist Geoff Packard and trumpeter Joey Pero for producing the most delicious musical jam session.

They do have excellent music to play, for composer Oberacker has a fine melodic sense. His songs are period-perfect, and not just the boogie-woogie numbers; the ballads are in tune with the ‘40s without sounding overly pastiche.

By the time Cott reveals that he’s an excellent pianist, we wonder “Is there anything this man can’t do?” The answer, sadly enough, is yes: he can’t make us like Donny Novitski.