A four-note harpsichord arpeggio. “Snap! snap!”

You know the sound.

“They’re creepy and they’re kooky,

Mysterious and spooky,

They’re all together ooky,

The Addams Family.”

You know the lyrics (written by Hollywood composer Vic Mizzy).

It’s “The Addams Family: The Broadway Musical,” in its Lehigh Valley regional theater debut, Oct. 9 -25, opening the 88th season of Civic Theatre of Allentown, just in time for the season of Halloween.

“Snap! Snap!”

“The Addams Family” TV show (1964 - ’66) starred Carolyn Jones (Morticia), John Astin (Gomez), Ted Cassidy (Lurch) and Jackie Coogan (Uncle Fester).

The 1991 movie adaptation directed by Barry Sonnenfeld starred Anjelica Huston (Morticia), Raul Julia (Gomez) and Christopher Lloyd (Lurch). There was a sequel, “Addams Family Values” (1993), another movie, several animated TV versions (which strayed from the original characters) and video games.

The Tee & Charles Addams Foundation, created in 1999 by Charles Addams’ widow, Tee, granted permission for the musical only if it was based on the characters of Charles Addams’ cartoons published in The New Yorker magazine from 1938 until Addams’ death in 1988.

The musical comedy has music and lyrics by Andrew Lippa and a book by Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice.

“The Addams Family” opened on Broadway in April 2010, starring Nathan Lane (Gomez) and Bebe Neuwirth (Morticia), and closed after 35 previews and 722 performances in December 2011. The Broadway show received several Drama Desk awards and was nominated for two Tony Awards.

A North American tour began in September 2011. “The Addams Family” international tour 2013-14 lasted 18 months, traversed the globe (including China, Argentina, Sweden and Mexico, the latter as “Los Locos Addams”), playing 128 cities and tallying 366 performances.

The, ahem, plot in the musical has to do with Wednesday inviting her boyfriend, Lucas Beineke, for a family dinner at their spooky Central Park mansion.

“They created their own treatment of a day or two in the life of the Addams Family,” Civic Theatre Artistic Director Williams Sanders, director-choreographer of Civic’s “The Addams Family,” says of the musical’s creators.

“Wednesday is now grown up and has fallen in love with a boy from a normal family. She invites her boyfriend’s family over for dinner and mayhem ensues.”

More than 25 girls auditioned for the role of Wednesday. “We had a really large turnout,” Sanders says of the auditions overall.

The cast of 23 Lehigh Valley actors has several who’ve been in Civic productions, including Jarrod Yuskauskas (Gomez), who played the title role in Civic’s 2014 season opener, “Young Frankenstein.”

The cast includes Mariah Dalton (Morticia), Emilie Leynes (Wednesday), Jordan King (Cousin Itt), Logan McCabe (Lurch), Christian Clausnitzer (Pugsley), Andrea Cartagena (Fester), Marie Ann Sutera (Grandmama).

The Beineke family is Thomas Riley (Lucas), Rob Clausnitzer (Mal) and Alyssa Haning (Alice).

The Addams Family Ancestors are: Guiliana Augello, Nina Elias, August Fegley, Abby Garza, Elizabeth Gonzalez, Zoli Heft, Denis Long, Krista Maxwell, Sarah Nekich, Luke Raso, Kristen Stachina and Aubree Williams.

Of the show’s rehearsals, Sanders says, “We’ve had a really amazing wonderful time. We’ve been laughing our butts off.”

The cast has the Addams Family “look.” Costume and lighting design is by Will Morris. “That was all Will Morris and Nina Reilly, who did the costumes. And Kim Danish did the wigs.”

Sound design is by Helena Confer. Stage manager is Emily Heller.

Set design is by Ann Beyersdorfer, a recent Syracuse University graduate recommended by Jason Sherwood, who did Civic shows’ set designs for the past three years. “She’s doing a fantastic job. The set’s amazing. It’s really cool.”

A 14-piece orchestra, conducted and with music direction by Steve Reisteter, is performing in the, er, pit. Co-Choreographer is Gwen Swanson Vigorito.

“We tried to be true to both the comic strip as well as the TV show. We tried to incorporate as many references as we can. In the course of the plot, there’s a farcical element. But it’s also a story about families and how we have to accept them as they are.

“The plot is totally pulled from ‘You Can’t Take It with You’ [the 1938 Frank Capra-directed movie based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart play] or that episode of “The Munsters” [TV show, 1964 - ‘66], where Marilyn brought somebody home.

“I think the interesting thing about this version is that Wednesday’s grown up, but nobody else’s aged, which I really think is funny,” says Sanders.

It’s no coincidence that Civic is staging “The Addams Family” as its 2015 - ‘16 season opener. Says Sanders:

“There was a method in that madness. And we did so well with ‘Young Frankenstein’ last year. You never really know what an audience is going to come see, but this seemed like a pretty safe bet that it would get people through the door. We like to open up the fall season with an audience favorite to get the season rolling.

“It’s a really funny Broadway musical. The music, the score, reflects the characters. Morticia has like a big razzamatazz Broadway number. And Fester’s stuff has a vaudevillian edge to it. And all of the score for Gomez has a real Latin flavor.”

Among the show’s some 23 songs are: “When You’re An Addams,” “Fester’s Manifesto,” “Wednesday’s Growing Up” and “Tango De Amor.”

“All the characters that you recognized from the movies, the TV show and the comic strip are there. It’s very family-friendly. There are only two slightly off-color jokes and I think they would go right over the head of kids,” says Sanders.

“The Addams Family,” 7:30 p.m. Oct. 9, 10, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24; 2 p.m. Oct. 18, 25, Civic Theatre of Allentown, Nineteenth Street Theatre, 527 N. 19th St., Allentown. Discounted tickets for groups of 10 or more. Reduced price tickets Oct. 9, 10. All seats are reserved. Free parking along Liberty and Allen near 19th Street and in the Wells Fargo Bank parking lot, 19th and Liberty streets, after banking hours. Tickets: Civic Theatre Box Office, CivicTheatre.com, 610-432-8943