It certainly sounds Bardic enough for the Royal Shakespeare Company's imprimatur, from the first-act bloodletting to the finale's mutual murder of mother and daughter. But, more crassly, is it Broadway?
Theater buffs on both sides of the Atlantic are about to find out whether the company has finally gone too far in its flirtation with the American musical form by trying to create a two-act musical of Stephen King's novella ''Carrie.''
Yes, Carrie is singing now, not merely requiting her tormentors at the high school prom with telekinetic death and getting terminally even with Mom's sulfurous natterings about lust.
The teen-age heroine, beset by gland and glamour in Mr. King's carmine variation on Cinderella, is evolving on the boards here at the Royal Shakespeare Theater as full-throated as Annie. She even hoofs a bit with her empty white prom dress in one of the ghostly special effects being rushed daily into the production as the musical is frantically basted and audience-tested eight times a week in the truly frightening occurrence that is the Broadway preview process.
Even as it is reworked, the company has announced that one of the principals, Barbara Cook, who plays the key role of Carrie's mother, will be replaced by mutual agreement by the the time the show opens in New York in two months. Miss Cook's voice has been rated by far the strongest in the cast by critics who were, however, dismayed by a role they contend is muddled by soigne matronliness and short on Mommie Dearest wickedness. Flying Dialogue and Plot
''It's terrifying every night,'' says Charlotte d'Amboise, a New York performer in the carefully mixed British-American company. She was happily describing not the plot but the shifting production in which new chunks of dialogue and lyrics, plot and ersatz pig's blood nightly fly into place as devilishly as if from the gravity-defying spites of Carrie herself.
Miss d'Amboise plays Chris, the chief bedeviler of Carrie in the catty claque of high school girls who find no end of fun in making an outcast of this soul-withered, beau-yearning child of a fanatic Bible-thumping widow. No end, that is, until the climactic prom scene that Brian De Palma turned into a memorably Apocalyptic rite of passage for the generation of pleased teen-agers and roiled parents who have experienced the movie version of ''Carrie.''
''Risk?'' responds the company's artistic director, Terry Hands. ''You can't deny that any show that begins with menstruation in the high school shower and ends with a double murder is obviously taking a risk. But that's the attraction, too.'' An Unusual Guarantee
Interestingly, the usual risk factor for this restless, ambitious major company - money - is not operative in this endeavor. For its $630,000 production costs, along with a minimum profit of $360,000, have been guaranteed by a most unusual angel, Fritz Kurz, a West German businessman who has helped bring such musicals as ''Cats'' and ''Starlight Express'' to West Berlin and now wants to take a larger flier.
But this arrangement has put the critical factor of prestige even more at risk than usual for the Royal Shakespeare. A few early arrivals from the Fleet Street critics have grumbled in print about the initial work in progress, describing it as moving in a ''pall of cliche'' and a measure of how far the company must stoop for money in Margaret Thatcher's Britain. But the audience applauded heartily tonight even as, jotting notes amid the dark, the production principals could be seen watching from midrow, preparing tomorrow's changes.
Miss Cook's replacement has not been announced as Broadway looms as inexorable as prom night. Just as unsettled is the final technical look of the show. One early critical complaint has been that the gore and terror effects emerge sanitized, at least for aficionados of the movie version, and that the diabolical edge of the story has been dulled. The 'Critical Hammering'
All such contributions are appreciated, said Mr. Hands, who sat with the audience tonight (''You must listen to the house,'' he said reverentially) after putting in three new scenes today along with fresh lyrics and special effects, with more to come. ''I haven't seen critical hammering like this since 'Les Miserables' and 'Nicholas Nickleby' were first in rehearsal,'' he said, obviously counting on another such turnaround for the final version of ''Carrie.''
Mr. Hands, one of the ranking English theater innovators, with decades of experience, has seen the Royal Shakespeare reach out increasingly to originate such trans-Atlantic hits as ''Les Miserables,'' ''Nicholas Nickleby'' and ''Les Liaisons Dangereuses.'' He chose to direct this musical himself from among the 40 productions the company presents annually in its double-repertory life here and in London. In particular, he describes savoring a sense of near operatic experimentation in attempting the modern-horror transition with such Americans as Debbie Allen, the choreographer, Lawrence D. Cohen, the librettist who also wrote the movie, and with Michael Gore, the music writer, and Dean Pitchford, the lyricist, who shared Academy Awards for the movie ''Fame.'' The Leap to Broadway
Under the unusual production conditions, the musical will finish four weeks of previews, all sold out, in the company's flagship theater here, then head directly to Broadway for a planned opening on May 1. To accomplish this feat, the company truncated the critical marriage of technical effects and acting production from a usual five weeks' fitting and tinkering to only five days before the first audiences arrived.
This meant a startling and, Mr. Hands stressed, still rough-edged ignition of the play. After seven weeks of private rehearsing of ever-evolving script, songs and dances, the cast had less than a week to suit up for opening night amid a hydraulic thicket of stagecraft, from a steamy chorus shower scene to the sudden descent of a huge white staircase, a final touch of heavenliness from Ralph Koltai, the set designer, to rival the piled chaos of the set for ''Les Miserables'' or the chandelier of ''The Phantom of the Opera.''
With all these efforts, the play at least has made such critics as Nicholas de Jongh of The Guardian wax Gothic, but only in describing vultures circling the Bard's birthplace, drawn by ''that succulent dramatic feast, a stillborn musical.''
But ''Carrie'' goes singing her way each night from pubescence to death before packed houses, with the production principals vowing the knocks can only help in her stage evolution as Broadway looms. They insist the helter-skelter pace of revamping is part of the fun.
In the curtain calls tonight, Linzi Hateley, the English-born star of the show, and at age 17 the company's youngest-ever leading lady, arose smiling from the death embrace with Barbara Cook to strong applause. The writers already were darting up the aisles with their notes for another night of hectic revisions. Miss Hateley stood beaming, mopping stage blood from herself, obviously surprised by the extra dousing she got in the latest version of the prom scene as ''Carrie'' is further fortified for Broadway.