In 1936, America was recovering from the Great Depression. Things weren't great, but they were getting better, even though many of the country's young men were off fighting in the Spanish Civil War and banks still weren't to be trusted. 

In fact, it was a social moment much like our own.

Which is partly why George Kaufman and Moss Hart's 1936 play, now in a technicolor revival on Broadway at the Longacre Theatre, feels so fresh and funny. "You Can't Take It With You" resonates, which makes this good-hearted romantic comedy even more delightful.

The story is a simple one. Alice Sycamore, played by a charming Rose Byrne, wants to marry her sweetheart Tony Kirby (Fran Kranz). But she's worried that her artistic, eccentric family will scare away his staid, Wall Street banker father and his elegant, socialite mother.

Alice's sister (Annaleigh Ashford) wafts through the living room in toe shoes; her father (Mark Linn-Baker) experiments with fireworks, which explode off the stage. Her mother (Kristine Nielsen) writes melodramatic plays about sex and war. And her grandfather, played with wry warmth by James Earl Jones, speaks in wise aphorisms — and collects snakes.

There's a Grand Duchess, a parlor game gone awry, a drunk actress, a toy battleship, G-men and two live cats. Like all good madcap comedies, the zaniness builds to high hilarity.

There's no big reveals here or dark family drama; If "August: Osage County" had an opposite, it would be this. It's just a delicious boy-wins-girl story.

And yet, underneath it all, is a central question: Is it better to be a dilettante, like the Sycamore family? Or a hard-working banker, like the father of Alice's sweetheart? Is the point of life to be happy or to make money? It turns out the answer is easy. After all, if the banking system might collapse again at any moment and the country is trembling on the edge of war — why not have fun?

 "You Can't Take It With You" is at the Longacre Theatre, 220 W. 48th Street.