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Do not be concerned if you stroll out to the Kravis Center lobby after the first act of Billy Crystal’s autobiographical one-man show, 700 Sundays, entertained yet wondering what all the acclaim for his 2005 Tony Award-winning comic monologue was about.

By the halfway point in the nearly three-hour evening, the star of television, film and Academy Award emceeing has certainly reminded us that his roots are in stand-up comedy. He knows how to connect with an audience, convulse us with laughter and pour on the ingratiating warmth.

But it is in the second act, when Crystal risks that rapport by taking us to a darker place, discussing the sudden death of his father from a bowling alley heart attack and the grief and anger that came with his loss, that the show rises above the usual Borscht Belt exercises in nostalgia and humor.

Crystal, the youngest of three sons who grew up in a post-World War II suburban Long Island home, was only 15 when his father died. In round numbers, that is about 700 Sundays that they got to spend together, to take in a Yankees game, have a game of catch or visit that architectural wonder, Grand Central Station.

One need not have grown up near New York, nor lost a parent at a young age to identify with Crystal’s tale. He really does understand the maxim that universality comes through specifics, well illustrated by his recollections of the arrival of his family’s first new car, his first romance and first heartbreak.

Not that Crystal’s childhood was particularly typical. His father ran a famous New York record store specializing in jazz albums and his uncle founded and ran a jazz record label. Surely Crystal is one of the few Jewish boys who saw his first feature film — 1953’s Shane — from Billie Holiday’s lap or who shared a Passover meal with Louis Armstrong.

Where most movie celebrities would fill their shows with clips from their feature films, Crystal would rather share the home movies his father shot. And who could blame Crystal for insisting on showing us proof that he was made an honorary New York Yankee on his 60th birthday last year, even if it means making us watch him strike out in his only at-bat.

The trauma of his father’s heart attack — and a coda on his mother’s stroke and subsequent death –takes up much of the second act of 700 Sundays. But Crystal and his director, Des McAnuff, are conscious to include some uproarious comic segments in between the sniffling. They will stoop to gas-passing shtick, a conversation between Crystal and his randy penis and a silent, but foul-mouthed movie reenactment is they can draw laughs, which they certainly do.

It is that juxtaposition of extremes that makes 700 Sundays such a crafty evening of theater. The show is certainly well written, but it is Crystal’s natural warmth and likeability that makes it so moving and memorable.

700 SUNDAYS

Where: Kravis Center, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach.

When: Through Sun., Dec. 6.

Tickets: $50-$750 (for Kravis Gala). Call: (561) 832-7469 or (800) 572-8471.

The verdict: Crystal delivers a marathon comic monologue, with a moving tribute to his late father woven into it.