The tots, some of them barely weaned and wheeled to the show in strollers, were wide-eyed. Apparently a lot of breeding has gone on in the South Bay, though kids dragged their blankies and parents from as far away as Oakland and San Francisco. Considering that it was a school night, the opening show drew an impressive 2,500 people. 'Barney's Big Surprise!' went the right way this week at the 3,800-seat venue where it opened Tuesday night. In all, 28 songs - many of them staples in the Barney dreamscape - are performed in a show loosely built around the idea that rambunctious, bright-yellow kid dinosaur BJ is about to celebrate his seventh birthday. All of it has a certain kitschy '70s look, and a corniness reminiscent of the pretelevision age. The big sets include an elaborate tree house and Tinkerputt's gadget- filled toy shop. It features Barney's friends, Baby Bop and BJ, toy inventor Professor Tinkerputt, Mother Goose and costumed nursery rhyme characters, and four kids who sing and dance. (Barney knows about attention spans - the show runs only 70 minutes, plus a 20-minute intermission.) It's the first live touring show starring the purple galoot, the most popular TV celebrity in the preschool world.

'Barney's Big Surprise!,' at the San Jose Event Center through Sunday, is a tasteful, terrific little kids' theater piece - sunny, comforting, energetic without being overwhelming, filled with music, splashy but not intimidating, and with the blessing of brevity. Stick a seven-foot-tall purple dinosaur on a stage, and by gosh it's a spectacle.

Dead not big surprise