Wondering what your director—in high school, community or even professional theater—says when a rehearsal is going downhill fast. Millions of years ago, when I was in high school, my drama teacher, the lovable retired Marine sergeant (you’re never a “former” Marine) Mr. Gaines, used to yell “You’re wrecking it!” and then we’d know to straighten up.

Some directors say, ”… and Scene!” as a way to break the tension that comes with a slipping scene. I’ve worked for others who thought they were movie directors and yelled “Cut!”

Others I’ve encountered: ”Oh, just stop!” “No! No! No!” “What play is THIS?”

Then there was the community theater director who wouldn’t stop us at all. We’d hear her laughing at the back of the auditorium, and laughing, and laughing, and laughing. We knew it was a comedy, but she was laughing when there were no laugh lines. We’d plow on through and keep hammering at it till the scene ended. And eventually we’d get notes on what she didn’t like. Let’s just say that wasn’t the most fruitful approach, although we were fully prepared when the audience laughed at the laugh lines…..

Do tell….What does YOUR director say?

When some people turn 70, their friends throw a party.

American playwright Israel Horovitz’s friends at the Barefoot Theatre Company have been marking his 70th birthday curating a year-long global festival of his works, 70 in all. The “70/70 Horovitz Project” will wrap up March 31, 2010, on the occasion of the playwright’s 71st birthday.

Two Lower Hudson Valley venues — Nyack’s Elmwood Playhouse and Hudson Stage Company in Briarcliff —?are participating in the celebration with staged readings of Horovitz plays.

This weekend, Elmwood and Pear Productions present “Man in Snow,” directed by Bernie Garzia. Next month, Scarsdale’s Matthew Arkin directs his mother, South Salem actress Barbara Dana, in “Fighting Over Beverly,” a one-night-only event Horovitz plans to attend.

Audiences in Nyack will be treated to an American premiere of a Horovitz work, a coup for a small community theater working with a brand-new production company.

Producer Paul Russo says it all started with Facebook.

Russo’s friend, “Man in Snow” cast member Erin deWard, had appeared in Horovitz’s “North?Shore Fish” years ago and was a Facebook friend of the playwright.

When deWard learned about 70/70 project, through a Facebook alert, she mentioned it to Russo, with whom she was shooting a movie in Haverstraw.

“In between takes, we were talking and we said ‘We should really be doing more. We want to be more in control of the process,’” Russo recalls, adding with a laugh: “Everyone else has a theater company, why shouldn’t we?”

Pear Productions was born.

Russo wondered if the 70/70 Project wouldn’t be a good place to start, but deWard doubted a brand-new company would be taken seriously.

“I wrote a letter, describing our connection to all the arts, Rockland World Radio, Elmwood Playhouse, Shades Repertory and Riverspace, at the time, which was open. And we got a beautiful acceptance letter, saying they looked forward to our contribution,” Russo recalls.

Then they had to find the right play.

A Web search eventually led Russo to an eclectic little site run by a British man who dabbled in everything from wine-making to BBC?radio shows.

There, on the site, was a blurb about a radio show Horovitz wrote for the BBC, “Man in Snow,” including the synopsis, which Russo can recite from memory:

“A more-than-middle-aged man climbs mountains, babysitting fornicating Japanese honeymooners.”

(Yes, you read that right.)

“I said ‘That’s the play for me!’” Russo jokes.

Mark Rinis, a retired Ramapo High School theater and English teacher who now lives in Riverdale, plays David Kipling, a grieving father whose friend asks him to lead a group of tourists up Alaska’s Mount McKinley.

It turns out that the tourists are Japanese honeymooners who are convinced that a son conceived under the aurora borealis will have untold power.

The original BBC?production won the Sony Radio Academy Award, the highest honor bestowed on U.K. radio programs.

Russo’s original plan was to broadcast the production over the Internet, but Horovitz demurred, suggesting that he had plans for a film version and an expanded stage adaptation of the radio play and that having an Internet incarnation out there might pose a problem.

Instead, it will be a “radio play on stage,” a sort of reader’s-theater presentation with seated actors reading from scripts.

Set designer Chantale Bourdages has draped the tiny Elmwood stage with sheer panels that suggest mountains, onto which images will be projected. Lighting designer Mike Gnazzo catches the actors in pools of light, and creates a Northern Lights effect.

Rinis, who plays the lead character, says the projections, music and sound will heighten the theatricality, but the writing is what will be front and center.

“The emotions are quite raw here,” he says.

Russo says the writing and structure of “Man in Snow” is lyrical and musical.

“Every word is so carefully crafted and the changes are like movements in a piece of music,” Russo says. He credited director Garzia for shaping the piece in the six weeks of rehearsal.

Elmwood, Nyack’s venerable 63-year-old community theater, happened to have a monthlong break between mainstage productions — “Beau Jest” closed Feb. 6, “Rabbit Hole” opens March 12 —providing an opening for “Man in Snow.”

The production will be filmed, to be included in a documentary on the “70/70 Horovitz Project,” Russo says.

If you go

What: “Man in Snow,” a radio play on stage

When: 8 p.m., Feb. 12 and 13; 7 p.m. Feb. 14.

Where: Elmwood Playhouse, 10 Park St., Nyack

Tickets: $21

Call: 914-353-1313

Web: www.elmwoodplayhouse.com

With: Erin deWard, Tanya Garzia, Michael Gruda, Mark Rinis, Sondra Rosoff and Paul Russo.

Also

Another Lower Hudson Valley company will host a 70/70 Horovitz production. At 7:30 p.m. on March 12, Hudson Stage presents Horovitz’s “Fighting Over Beverly,” directed by Scarsdale’s Matthew Arkin and featuring Arkin’s mom, South Salem actress Barbara Dana, as part of a senior love triangle. Horovitz is planning to attend the Hudson Stage reading and take part in the post-show Q&A. $10, general admission. At Woodward Hall Theatre, 235 Elm Road, Briarcliff Manor. At www.hudsonstage.com or call 914-271-2811.

70/70

To learn more about the 70/70 Horovitz Project, go to www.barefoottheatrecompany.org.

Did you know?

Israel Horovitz is the father of Beasty Boy Adam Horovitz. His life, as a playwright raising a large family, was the focus of his screenplay for the film, “Author! Author!” which starred Al Pacino.

Photo by Peter D. Kramer/The Journal News: The cast of “Man in Snow” includes, from left: Erin deWard, Sondra Rosoff and Mark Rinis.

Everything’s coming up Shakespeare this year, as New Rochelle Council on the Arts plans an ambitious “Sound Shore Shakespeare Festival” with a grant from New York Council on the Humanities.

The festival, which runs March through May, folds some already established works under the umbrella of the over-arching effort, including Dee O’Brien’s magical Semi-Royal Shakespeare Company at Hommocks Middle School.

Events are planned in Larchmont, Mamaroneck and New Rochelle.

Here’s the schedule:

March 4 – 7: Semi Royal Shakespeare Company performances at Hommocks Middle School in Larchmont; tickets $10; visit www.mamkschools.org to reserve.

• March 4: 7:30 p.m. “Macbeth”


• March 5: 8 p.m. “The Taming of the Shrew”


• March 6: 2 p.m. “The Taming of the Shrew”; 8 p.m. “Macbeth”


• March 7: 1 p.m. “Macbeth”; 7 p.m. “The Taming of the Shrew”

March 27 and April 14: “The Met Live in HD” at New Roc Regal Cinema, 6:30 pm: “Hamlet – Ambroise Thomas” Adults $22, seniors $20, students $15. Simon Keenlyside and Natalie Dessay bring their extraordinary acting and singing skills to two of the Bard’s most unforgettable characters in this new production. Watch it live on March 27th or enjoy the encore performance on April 14th.

April 18: “Odes for the Bard” Enjoy the literary musings of the Bard, a little light music and a tasty reception designed to whet the senses of the Shakespearean age. At 3 pm at St. John’s Wilmot Episcopal Church, corner of North Avenue at Wilmot Road. Sponsored by the New Rochelle Council on the Arts and The New Rochelle Garden Club in celebration of the city’s annual Daffodil Festival. Free. Contact info@newrochellearts.org for details.

April 23: Shakespeare’s Birthday Celebration at Iona College. Celebrate the 349th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death (and perhaps the 446th anniversary of his birth) at Iona College with Professor John Mahon, co-editor of The Shakespeare Newsletter. Enjoy some birthday cake and a lecture by this leading authority on the Bard. Free. Call (914) 633-2060 for details.

May 4 – 17: “Inspired by Shakespeare” Exhibit at the Museum of Arts & Culture. A juried art show of works in a variety of media; artists will be asked to provide a statement that ties their work to a specific inspiration in the work of William Shakespeare, either a specific play or sonnet, a character or a scene. Opening reception May 13th at 7 pm. The MAC is a program of the New Rochelle Fund for Educational Excellence and is open to the public Mondays through Fridays, 9 am to 3 pm, and Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 7 to 9 pm. For details visit www.dbmac.org.

May 7-8: Knighthorse Theater Company in residence at New Rochelle High School (Linda Kelly Theater). Because Knighthorse Theater Company travels without sets and uses only minimal props, the “magic” of their productions is wholly dependent upon the supremacy of Shakespeare’s language and the vast, untapped potential of the combined imaginations of actors and audience. Knighthorse will conduct student workshops by invitation only during the day May 6th and 7th; evening performance May 7th and 8th will be open to the public. Tickets cost $15 for adults, $10 for students and seniors, with all proceeds benefiting the Museum of Arts & Culture. Visit www.dbmac.org for details.

May 11 (rain date May 18): Concert in the Shakespeare Garden at Davenport Park, sponsored by New Rochelle Council on the Arts, New Rochelle Garden Club and New Rochelle Parks & Recreation. One of the first of its kind in the U.S. the Shakespeare Garden was planted by the Avon Bard Society in 1937. Enjoy views of the garden and Long Island Sound during this free outdoor concert. (Rain date is May 18th) Visit www.newrochellearts.org for more information.

May 13-27 : A Shakespeare Film Festival at the New Rochelle Public Library. A free film series featuring cinematic versions of Shakespeare’s works with interpretive discussions led by Iona College professors John Mahon and Tom Pendleton, co-editors of The Shakespeare Newsletter. Films will be shown at 7 pm in the Ossie Davis Theater. Visit www.nrpl.org for details.

All events listed are subject to change; visit www.newrochellearts.org for regular updates.

Just a few words of praise for “Bronx Kiss,” Purchase College’s second foray south to the Emelin Theater in Mamaroneck.

First, the piece — a culling-together of scenes by Pulitzer Prize-winner John Patrick Shanley — is ideally suited to the intimate venue it now calls home. Director Benard Cummings leads a first-rate cast of third-year students in work that is heartfelt without being sentimental. There are laughs, there are knowing nods, but none of it is so sweet it’ll make your teeth hurt.

In “Danny and the Deep Blue Sea,” Steven Laing and Christine Osuala play a couple waking up from a one-night stand wondering if there’s more to their relationship than meets the eye.

In “Four Dogs and a Bone,” Cassie Post and Arielle Uppaluri play a pair of catty actresses on a movie shoot. (That’s Cassie, left, and Arielle, in a photo by Christopher Thompson.)

In “Women of Manhattan,” Christopher Stevenson and Sofia Lauwers are on a typically Gotham blind date.

In the charming “Red Coat,” Christopher Perfetti and Emily Fleischer find love between a beautiful streetlight and a tree-shrouded moon, in a scene that is reminiscent of Shanley’s most popular work, “Moonstruck,” for which he won the Oscar.

In “Lonely Impulse of Delight,” Devin Doyle and Micah Stock are friends, and Joanna Hartshorne is the female who comes between them, in a way.

In “Italian-American Reconciliation,” a full production of which once played at the Emelin years ago, Eunice Hong is the carping Janice, Frank Winters is the loveable Aldo and Aaron McDaniel arrives late in the action as the confused Huey.

The evening’s final offering, “Welcome to the Moon,” features Sean Willkens, Perfetti (in a role that makes him unrecognizable from his earlier appearance as the lovestruck John in “Red Coat”), Stock, McDaniel and Hartshorne. Shanley fills the bar with characters in search of love.

In a Purchase tradition, there is no traditional curtain call in which each actor takes a bow. The cast appears in a tableau to receive their well-earned applause. Looking from face to face, one realizes that the entire enterprise of the evening was the search for love. Sometimes love is found. Sometimes not. But the ride was great fun.

You can find “Bronx Kiss” this weekend at the Emelin, 153 Library Lane, Mamaroneck. Remaining performances are tonight at 7:30, tomorrow at 2 and 7:30 and Sunday at 2.

Call 914-698-0098 for tickets, which are $20, $15 for Purchase Rep subscribers, seniors and non-Purchase students, and $5 for Purchase students and faculty.

PMT Productions’ annual fund-raiser — the Westchester Teen Idol contest — is well under way. Auditions held on Jan. 9 determined the finalists for the Feb. 27 concert at Irvington Town Hall Theater. The judges for the contest are:  Broadway’s Carole Demas, Michael James Leslie, Craig Schulman and composer and recording engineer Duncan Stanbury!

The 2010 “Westchester Teen Idol Finalists” Are:

1. Connor Antico (Rye, NY)
2. Isaac Assor   (New Rochelle, NY)
3. Julia Battistin (Dobbs Ferry, NY)
4. Taylor Bradley (Dobbs Ferry, NY)
5. Scott Brown  (Old Greenwich, CT)
6. Caitlin Caporale  (Newburgh, NY)
7. Grace Clary  (Tarrytown, NY)
8. Nicole DeLuca  (Fort Lee, NJ)
9. Andrea Denis  (Ossining, NY)
10. Brian Gips  (Mount Kisco, NY)
11. Kira Goldsmith  (Ossining, NY)
12. Channa Gross  (New Rochelle, NY)
13. Heather Gross  (Montrose, NY)
14. Ella Jesmajian  (Hastings-On-Hudson, NY)
15. Rebecca Leon (Ardsley, NY)
16. Jessica Lynch  (Briarcliff, NY)
17. Dylan Manderlink (Ridgefield, CT)
18. Lauren Moore  (Mount Kisco, NY)
19. Alexis Newman  (Yonkers, NY)
20. Amelia Profaci  (Huntington Station, NY)
21. Kaitlyn Rosenblum  (Buchanan, NY)
22. Cheyenne See  (Poughkeepsie, NY)
23. Rebecca Simpson-Wallack  (Briarcliff, NY)
24. Lauren Spatafore  (Rye Brook, NY)
25. Deneisa Wharton  (Yonkers, NY)

Not exactly sure how Huntington Station, Ridgefield, Old Greenwich, Poughkeepsie, Fort Lee and Newburgh qualify as “Westchester,” but perhaps its enough that they’ll be singing in Westchester on Feb. 27?

Danielle Rudess, producer of the Metropolitan High School Theater Awards, emailed today to mention that the deadline for the 2010 Metros — the Oscars of the high-school-musical realm across the Lower Hudson Valley — is fast approaching.

February 15 is the deadline to enter for consideration for the 2010 Metropolitan Awards, which honor outstanding achievement in high-school musical theater.

Registration is open to all schools in Westchester, Rockland and Bergen counties. The online application form as well as information about the awards is available online at www.hstheaterawards.com. Or call 845-826-2049.

There are those who reject awards for high-school theater, saying that it diminishes the purity of the enterprise. Others see the benefit of competition, as a means of preparing kids for a world in which competition is a way of life, particularly the world of the theater.

Last year, another incentive to enter was added to the mix. The winners of the best-actor and best-actress Metros — Aaron Sauer of Sloatsburg and Michele Rubich of Briarcliff —  were entered into the inaugural National High School Musical Awards, nicknamed “The Jimmys” for theatrical impresario James Nederlander.

For a week, they attended master classes with Broadway pros, learned production numbers and attended a Broadway show alongside winners of theater awards from across the country.

By the end of the awards show, one actor and one actress—Steven Mark of Ridgefield High School in Ridgefield, Conn., and Jenny Wine of Wichita High School in Wichita, Kansas) were named winners of the inaugural Jimmys. Their prizes included $10,000 to further their education and an incredible opportunity: eligibility for a FOUR-YEAR SCHOLARSHIP TO NYU’S TISCH SCHOOL. (You can read my posts from the morning after The Jimmys here.)

Photo by Joe Larese/The Journal News: Michelle Rubich of Briarcliff High School receives her Metropolitan award for outstanding actress in a leading role at the Paramount Center for the Arts on June 8, 2009. Rubich went on to represent the Lower Hudson Valley at the inaugural National High School Musical Awards, the Jimmys.

“When you read about Lincoln, you find so many points of view that you have to locate Lincoln within your own sensibility, withing your own world view, within your own class, within your own race. That’s what we do with icons.”

Commissioned to create a dance to mark the bicentennial of the birth of the 16th American president, Jones read book after book, visited Lincoln-related historic sites and contemplated the man and his legacy.

When he first set out, he planned to call the piece “A Great Man? A Great Man,” and to take what he calls a “prosecutorial approach,” taking Lincoln to task.

“There’s a lively community of debunkers, I’m not calling them crazies, who say he was a warmonger, a racist, a politician, a corporate running dog,” Jones says over tea in a Nyack patisserie.

“I thought, ‘I’ll be tough-minded, too. I won’t give in to that 5-year-old who just loves Lincoln as Santa Claus.’ But after reading about him, as icons go, he’s a benign icon. I think he stood for all the right things, a self-educated curious intellect, a moral thinker, physically strong.”

Asked to create one dance, Jones came up with three: “Serenade/The Proposition,” two works in one setting; and “Fondly Do We Hope … Fervently Do We Pray,” which comes to Purchase College on Friday, the 201st anniversary of Lincoln’s birth.

The latter piece takes its title from Lincoln’s Second Inaugural: “Fondly do we hope — fervently do we pray — that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away.”

Friday’s performance is a homecoming of sorts. The first time “Fondly” was put on its feet was at a weeklong technical workout in the Concert Hall in August, in preparation for the premiere at the Ravinia Festival outside of Chicago.

Jones will herald the piece with a visit to the Purchase campus on Thursday for a Performance-in-Context discussion at 6 p.m., in the Repertory Theatre.

There’s plenty to talk about when it comes to Lincoln and Jones’ work inspired by him.

The words of “Fondly” are the words of Lincoln and Walt Whitman. They are also the words of Jones and members of the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company, as they talk about Lincoln as they find him.

“When you read about Lincoln, you find so many points of view that you have to locate Lincoln within your own sensibility, withing your own world view, within your own class, within your own race,” Jones says. “That’s what we do with icons.”

What Jones does with this particular icon is to track his life, his debates, his speeches, his love and then to examine those elements through the prism of contemporary times, to the place of race in our modern world.

It’s Lincoln in the age of Obama.

Jones, a whirlwind of creative energy who calls Valley Cottage home, is in the middle of a tornado of creative output.

He unveiled “Fondly” at Ravinia in September.

In November, the Tony-winning choreographer of “Spring Awakening” was christened a Broadway director, shepherding the Afrobeat musical “FELA!” to the Eugene O’Neill Theater, where it drew enthusiastic reviews.

Jones wrote on his blog last May, as he continued to shape and form his Lincoln triptych: “A dance theater work about Mr. Lincoln as I conceive it comes with some obstacles. They might be roughly delineated by these two familiar categories: form and content. Formally, I remain suspicious of the biopic narrative and yet, if there was ever an individual and an era, which cried out for a narrative it is this man and that time.”

All three Lincoln works are now touring the country Lincoln once led; like that country, the work is ever evolving. The show that premiered at Ravinia is not the show that comes to Purchase. Jones is forever tinkering, tweaking, tightening.

“Fondly” is not a piece of pure dance: Jones has created a dance-theater-sound hybrid.

It occupies a stage, yes, and it is largely an ambitious dance piece, but there are spoken and sung elements that expand the scope of the work. All of this occurs among white columns, within the folds of set designer Bjorn Amelan’s elegant white curtain which serves as a backdrop onto which words and lights are projected.

For Jones, even a hybrid piece is rooted in the body and movement.

“Even though I am a very theatrical choreographer, at the crux of it all is a preoccupation with formal aspects of body,” he says. “That comes from my training as a postmodern choreographer. Ultimately, it’s less about mime and even storytelling than it is about articulating the body in space and time.

“The body in space and time now meets a historical topic. The purpose of our work is to present a sort of a mirror of that era in our era now. And the body is the thing that connects us.”

The music includes some of Lincoln’s favorite folk songs, and the work of Felix Mendelssohn, which, Jones says, was played at the president’s inauguration and on the funeral train as it made its somber way back to Springfield in April 1865.

How, then, should ticketholders approach an evening that isn’t entirely dance and isn’t entirely theater or music?

“I think they should go in very relaxed, because from the moment they sit in their seat, there’s information in the air, there’s a sound score,” Jones says.

“The quick ears in the room are going to hear an exploded catalogue of everything the evening is going to have in it.”

When the dancers enter the space, that catalogue will expand to include them and the audience, Jones says. Then the audience will begin to make connections.

“The human brain is always trying to make connections,” Jones says. “This is not made in such a way that the audience is passive.

“This is more like walking into an art gallery. Walk in front of a Robert Rauschenberg combine in the late ’60s and you see a goat inside of a tire covered with paint and he’s standing on a platform that has strange things written on it. And you stand there and you scratch your head and either you walk away or you say, ‘OK, goat inside tire with paint on it.’ You start participating in recreating what it could possibly mean.

“I would say to them: ‘Come in, relax, with the feeling of exploring something. Start looking for evidence when you walk in. Listen to what’s going on. And when it’s over, when you leave the theater that night — if you didn’t walk out on me — or the next day at breakfast, what sticks? What things do you remember?’ Because there’s a lot of repetitions and permutations. That is the fun for me.”

What: “Fondly Do We Hope … Fervently Do We Pray” in its New York premiere

When: 8 p.m. Feb. 12.

Where: Purchase College Performing Arts Center, 735 Anderson Hill Road, Purchase.

Tickets: $42.50 to $72.50.

Call: 914-251-6200

Web: www.artscenter.org

Meet Bill T. Jones Bill T. Jones will attend a Performance-in-Context discussion at 6 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 11 in the Repertory Theatre. Free and open to the public. For details, call 914-251-6200.

‘Lincoln, Life-Size’ The Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Conn., opens its newest exhibition, “Lincoln, Life-Size,” on Feb. 13. The exhibition features photographs of the 16th president reproduced full size, alongside 19th-century images and artifacts. The Bruce plans public programs linked to the exhibit. At 1 Museum Drive, Greenwich, Conn. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.,Tuesdays through Saturdays; 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., Sundays; closed Mondays and major holidays — but open to the public on President’s Day, Feb. 15, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Call 203-869-0376, or go to www.brucemuseum.org.

Top photo by Seth Harrison: Bill T. Jones discusses “Fondly Do We Hope … Fervently Do We Pray” at a Nyack patisserie last month. The piece gets its New York premiere on Friday, the 201st anniversary of Lincoln’s birth.

Second photo by Paul Goode: A moment from “Fondly Do We Hope … Fervently Do We Pray.”

Third photo by Alexander Gardner, courtesy Bruce Museum: Abraham Lincoln, Nov. 8, 1863, in Washington, D.C.

They’re promising a “lively discussion” in Nyack tonight as elected officials, community leaders and the board of Riverspace Arts convene — with special guest Rosie O’Donnell—at Casa Del Sol.

The topic is the potential redevelopment of the “Superblock” in downtown Nyack, where the limping-along arts center now stands. The former movie theater and performing-arts center has been reduced to occasional concerts and youth theater shows, a shadow of its former self.

O’Donnell, who lives in South Nyack, has pledged $80,000 for a feasability study on the project.

Riverspace president Debbie Reich says in an e-mail that “Senator Chuck Schumer, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and Congressman Eliot Engel will be represented at the gathering. Many state, county and local officials will also attend to express their enthusiasm for redeveloping downtown Nyack.”

She adds that “Wonderful things are happening for Riverspace…we have turned the corner.”

The meeting runs from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Casa Del Sol, 104 Main St., Nyack.

The Hope For Change Foundation will hold auditions for “SWINGIN’ FOR A CURE,” Feb. 22 from 6 to 8 p.m. and Feb. 23 from 7 to 9 p.m. at St. Paul the Apostle School, 77 Lee Ave. (off McLean Avenue), Yonkers. Singers are asked to prepare a song in the style of Big Band or swing. Dancers, to wear comfortable clothing and shoes you can dance in. All those auditioning are welcome to both sing and dance. Performers must be 18 or older.

Production dates are April 9 and  10 at 7:30 p.m.

Hope for Change is also looking for a box-office manager, a sound operator, a lighting operator, help with publicity and decoration/hospitality. The show will be produced by Nicole Bauso and Alyssa Manning, with direction by Jason Summers, musical direction by Carol Arrucci, and choreography by Jessica Bittner. Contact Alyssa Manning at manning.alyssa@gmail.com.

The Hope For Change Foundation is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to raising money for breast-cancer research through theatrical programming. All proceeds from the HFC’s productions are donated to hospitals, research centers, and other groups that are working to find a cure.

Most Saturdays for more than a generation, Garrison Keillor has held radio listeners rapt near the close of his live show “A Prairie Home Companion” with 15 minutes of homespun humor called “The News from Lake Wobegon.” In those monologues, he has introduced a host of locals, from Clarence Bunsen to Pastor Ingqvist to Bruno the fishing dog.

But to see Garrison Keillor do his show, sing his songs, tell his stories, you had few options:

• Fly to St. Paul, Minn., to catch “PHC” at the Fitzgerald Theater;

• Find the show on one of its tour stops; or

• Get to Manhattan’s Town Hall in April or December when the show makes an East Coast pilgrimage.

On Thursday, your options get a little easier when “A Prairie Home Companion” is “cinecast” to more than 500 movie theaters nationwide, including the City Center in White Plains and New Roc City in New Rochelle. For the uninitiated, a cinecast — which sounds like something you’d order at Starbucks — is a live event broadcast to a cinema.

In this case, it’s Keillor’s American Public Media radio show that can be heard live on Saturdays — just two days early, on a big screen and in high-definition.

Being a shy Minnesotan, and a Lutheran, and, well, Garrison Keillor, has meant that the radio star doesn’t really get a charge out of watching himself on screen.

“I never have, but I think it’s time that I should,” he says. “I’ve never seen the show and I’ve become curious about it, after 35 years, to know what it is people see when they come to it.”

He says he agreed to have the show cinecast, “because I saw the Metropolitan Opera cinecast of ‘Eugene Onegin’ long ago and it was just the most wonderful thing I’d ever seen in a movie theater. I’m not Renée Fleming and I’m not Dmitri Hvorostovsky, but I was just really moved by this and I believe in live entertainment and I think that this has a place in the world. The live TV variety show is dead. Somebody will revive it, but I won’t. And I’d like people to be able to see this show because there isn’t anything quite like it. That’s just a fact and I’m sorry about that, but it’s true.”

Thursday’s live show — which will get an encore cinecast on Feb. 9 — will be taped for the radio and broadcast in the show’s usual time slot. Locally, on WNYC (AM 820 and FM 93.9), from 6 to 8 p.m. Saturdays; 11 a.m. Sundays (on AM 820).

Tickets to the live cinecast — from 8 to 10 p.m. Thursday — are $20; the encore, $18.

Those listening on the radio all those years might have thought Keillor was reading those stories.

They’d have been wrong.

“They assume that I am reading a monologue or that I must have a teleprompter, but I don’t,” Keillor says. “To me, this does not seem so remarkable. To me, this seems no more remarkable than Tony Bennett standing up and singing without using cue cards. It’s just how this is supposed to be done, that’s all.

“You should be able to stand up in front of an audience and talk to them,” he says. “If you can’t think of anything during those awful moments when you can’t remember what you were going to tell them, then you should find some other line of work. This is my line of work. You walk out in front of an audience and there they are. And they’re glad to see you and you just sort of ride that wave and don’t shoot yourself in the foot.”

The guests for Thursday’s cinecast include Elvis Costello, Robin and Linda Williams, Jearlyn & Jevetta Steele and Heather Masse. The Guys All-Star Shoe Band, a PHC fixture, will add a few horns, Keillor says, and the show will employ two sound-effects men — Tom Keith and Fred Newman — and its customary company of radio actors.

Another show fixture, in which Keillor reads greetings written by the audience, is going “cinecast,” too, with submissions from the Internet.

Lake Wobegon, Keillor tells his audience weekly, is “where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking and all the children are above average.”

On Thursday, all the actors are in hi-def, all the sound is Dolby and all the seating is stadium.

If you go

What: “A Prairie Home Companion” cinecast in HD.

When: 8 p.m. Feb. 4 live. Encore presentation 8 p.m. Feb. 9.

Where: City Center 15: Cinema De Lux, 19 Mamaroneck Ave., White Plains (914-747-6000); Regal New Roc City 18, 33 Le Count Place, New Rochelle (914-235-5106).

Tickets: $20 for Feb. 4 live; $18 for Feb. 9 encore.

Web: prairiehome.publicradio.org.

Submit a greeting

Halfway through his radio show, Keillor reads greetings from the audience to those listening at home. In the cinecast, he’ll read greetings submitted on the “Prairie Home” Web site.

Photo by Dana Nye:  The cast of “A Prairie Home Companion” includes, from left, Fred Newman, Tim Russell, Sue Scott and Garrison Keillor.

Megan Harris has worn several hats in her years at Purchase College’s theater and film conservatory — assistant stage manager and stage manager — but it wasn’t until this week that the senior from Philadelphia had to pick up a show and put it down elsewhere.

As production stage manager (the person responsible for coordinating all departments), Harris has been in the thick of things this week as she and her team move “Bronx Kiss” from Purchase’s Pepsico Theater, where it was built and rehearsed, to Mamaroneck’s Emelin Theater, where it opens tonight for a one-weekend run.

It’s the second straight year that interim dean Greg Taylor has arranged with the Emelin to take the Purchase Rep show on the road. Last year, it was David Ives’ “All in the Timing,” a collection of short, funny, quirky pieces.

This year, it’s John Patrick Shanley’s work that provides the moveable feast.

“Bronx Kiss” is a collection of early plays and scenes by Shanley, who won the Pulitzer Prize and Tony for “Doubt” and an Oscar for his “Moonstruck” screenplay.

The production, directed by Benard Cummings, features Purchase Rep’s Junior Acting Company, 15 actors who will perform scenes from Shanley’s “Danny and the Deep Blue Sea,” “Four Dogs and a Bone,” “Women of Manhattan,” “The Red Coat,” “A Lonely Impulse of Delight,” “Italian-American Reconciliation,” and “Welcome to the Moon.”

Cummings writes on the Emelin blog: “I have subtitled Bronx Kiss ‘a day in the life of NYC.’ A 24-hour cityscape. From morn-to-midnight. The triumphs and travails of the concrete jungle. Seven works with a wide range of humanity, as diverse as the city itself. Sex, violence, guilt, retribution, fantasy, religion, redemption, hate, and above all, Love.”

The students have rehearsed the moves they’ll make: when they enter and exit, how they’ll fill the tiny Emelin space. But it wasn’t until Monday that they first set foot on the Mamaroneck stage.

It was Harris’ job to bring all of the departments — sets, costumes, lighting, sound and actors — together, give them what they need to ready the show in the much larger?700-seat Pepsico Theater.

Company manager Jen Levine was tasked with handling all the logistics of the move to the 250-seat Emelin, including, Harris says: “how’s everybody getting to the Emelin, what they’ll eat at the Emelin, all that stuff.”

One of Harris’ jobs was to give the actors a sense of how much smaller things are at their weekend home on Library Lane.

To do this, the crew put tape on the floor to show the footprint of the stage, but also the backstage areas.

“We wanted to give the actors the sense of, ‘Hey, all this room you think you have, you don’t have.’

“They were like, ‘No! No! We know it’s cramped’ and we had to tell them ‘You think you know, but where you are standing now, at the Emelin, there is a wall.’”

There are dozens of details, besides getting the actors to trust her, that Harris must see to. The show was mounted, lit and fully staged, and then disassembled to be carted the nine miles to Mamaroneck.

The entire project is a great learning experience for all involved, Harris says, a chance to understand how a touring show works.

This isn’t just an academic exercise: within a couple of years, these students plan to be working on touring shows or Broadway, where lessons they’ve learned this week at the Emelin might just come back to them.

An unexpected benefit of working in the Pepsico Theater — not the usual black-box where Purchase Rep typically works — is that the lighting design could be more closely replicated by lowering the bars on which the lights are hung, something not possible in the black box.

The actors, too, will see a benefit at the more intimate Emelin.

“A lot of times at Purchase, directors will tell actors to project and be louder because they can’t be heard,” Harris says. “At the Emelin, they’re fine because it’s smaller. They’ll be able to hear every word.”

What: “Bronx Kiss: A Celebration of John Patrick Shanley,” presented by the Purchase Repertory Theatre, Conservatory of Theatre Arts & Film, Purchase College, SUNY.

When: 8 p.m. Feb. 4; 7:30 p.m. Feb. 5; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Feb. 6; 2 p.m. Feb. 7.

Where: Emelin Theater, 153 Library Lane, Mamaroneck.

Tickets: $20; Seniors and non-Purchase students $15; Purchase students, faculty and staff $5

Call: 914-698-0098

Web: www.emelin.org

Pearl River High School Repertory Company presents “The Curious Savage,” a comedy by John Patrick, on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 5 and 6, at 7 p.m. in the school auditorium. $8 for adults, $5 for students at the door or in advance by calling 845-620-3801.

Here’s a bit from the press release: “Directed by Chelsea Strazza Jevens, PRHS math teacher and Pirate Repertory Company alumnus, the show tells the story about a newly-widowed woman and her children’s reactions when she decides to fund the ridiculous dreams of people with the $10 million her husband left her. The cast includes Emma Greenwood, Liz Smith, Kimberly O’Toole, Jake Servino, Kevin Finer, and Jennifer Nardella.

Pearl River High School is at 275 East Central Avenue in Pearl River. Take the first entrance off of East Central Avenue and continue around the building to the flagpole entrance.”

Here’s the chronological list of which high schools are doing which musicals between now and May. Mount Vernon and Mamaroneck have yet to set the show and the dates of their musicals; Hastings has set the dates, but not the show. Note that ticket prices, unless otherwise noted, are for adults and then for students and seniors.

White Plains: Damn Yankees—7:30 p.m. Feb. 5, 6; 3 p.m. Feb. 7—$10/$5—914-422-2234

Rye Country Day: Urinetown the Musical—8 p.m. Feb. 26, 27—$15, $12 students—914-925-4576

Byram Hills: Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat—7:30 p.m. March 4; 8 p.m. March 5; 2 and 8 p.m. March 6—$12/$10—914-273-9200, ext. 4557

Rye: How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying— 7 p.m. March 4; 8 p.m. March 5; 2 and 8 p.m. March 6—$10/$5 students/seniors free—914-967-6100

Rye Neck: Peter Pan—7 p.m. March 4, 5; 1 p.m and 7 p.m. March 6—$17.50/$10 students—jpezzola@ryeneck.k12.ny.us

Salesian: West Side Story—7:30 p.m. March 4, 5, 6; 2:30 p.m. March 7—$15—914-632-0248

Irvington: Once Upon a Mattress—7:30 p.m. March 5, 6, 12, 13; 2 p.m. March 7—$15/$8—914-591-6645

Nanuet: Once Upon a Mattress—8 p.m. March 5, 6—$10—845-627-9850

North Rockland: Anything Goes—7:30 p.m. March 5, 6, 11, 12, 13—$10/$8—845-942-3000, ext. 4954

North Salem: Oliver!—8 p.m. March 5, 6; 2 p.m. March 7—$10—914-669-5414

Westlake: The Music Man—8 p.m. March 5, 6, 12, 13; 2 p.m. March 7—$12/$10—914-769-0437

Bronxville: Anything Goes—5 p.m. March 11; 7p.m. March 12 and 13—$10—914-787-0317

John Jay: The Sound of Music—7 p.m. March 11; 8 p.m. March 12, 13; 2 p.m. March 13—$10/$5—www.jjhs.klschools.org

Kennedy: Fiddler on the Roof—7 p.m. March 11, 12, 13; 2 p.m. March 14—$15/$12—914-509-1401

Ursuline: Into the Woods—7 p.m. March 11, 12, 13—$10—914-636-3950

Clarkstown: NorthAnything Goes—8 p.m. March 12, 13, 19, 20—$12—845-639-5676

Harrison: Footloose—7 p.m. March 12, 13, 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 14—$10/$5—914-630-3110

Masters School: Thoroughly Modern Millie—7 p.m. March 12, 13—Free—914-479-6400

Nyack: My Favorite Year—8 p.m. March 12, 13, 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 14, 20—$12/$7 students/seniors free—845-353-7101

Pleasantville: Once Upon a Mattress—8 p.m. March 12, 13, 19, 20; 3 p.m. March 14—$15/$12—914-830-4343

Somers: Anything Goes—8 p.m. March 12, 13; 2 p.m. March 14—$15/$9 students—914-248-8585

Ardsley: Urinetown the Musical—7:30 p.m. March 18, 19, 20—$10/$8—914-693-6300, ext. 2281

Blind Brook: All Shook Up—7 p.m. March 18; 7:30 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$12—914-937-3600, ext. 3171

Brewster: Oklahoma!—7:30 p.m. March 18, 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 20—$12/$10 students—845-279-5051 ext. 722

Edgemont: The Pajama Game—7 p.m March 18; 8 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$15—914-472-6786

Suffern: Les Miserables—7 p.m. March 18, 19; noon and 7 p.m. March 20—$15/$10—845-357 -3800 ext. 399

Tuckahoe: Willy Wonka—7:30 p.m. March 18, 19, 20—$10/$5—914-337-5376 ext. 1233

Woodlands: The Sound of Music—7:30 p.m. March 18, 19, 20—$10/$5 seniors—914-761-6052

Briarcliff: Grease!—7:30 p.m. March 19; 8 p.m. March 20; 2:30 p.m. March 21—$12.50—briarcliffticketsales@gmail.com

Carmel: Damn Yankees—7:30 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$12/$10—845-225-8441, ext. 478

Clarkstown South: The Wiz—8 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$12/$10—845-638-3077

Croton-Harmon: Annie Get Your Gun—7:30 p.m. March 19, 20; 1 p.m. March 21—$10/$5 students/seniors free—At the door

Dobbs Ferry: Once Upon a Mattress—7:30 p.m. March 19, 20—$12/$5 students/seniors free—914-837-0462

Fox Lane: Beauty and the Beast—\7:30 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 20, 21—$15/$10—914-864-3499

Haldane: Into the Woods—7 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$9/$7—845-265-9254 ext. 138

Hendrick Hudson: Grease!—8 p.m. March 19, 20; 3 p.m. March 20, 21—$15/$10—914-257-5800

Pelham: Zombie Prom—8 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$15/$10—914-738-8110, ext. 1000

Ramapo: Fame—7:30 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$10/$8—845-577-6400

Tappan Zee: Cabaret—8 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$8/$5 students/seniors free—845-680-1601

Valhalla: The Sound of Music—\8 p.m. March 19; 1 p.m. and 8 p.m. March 20—$12/$10—vhsdramasociety@yahoo.com

Yorktown: Beauty and the Beast—7:30 p.m. March 19, 20; 2 p.m. March 21—$10—914-243-8051

Spring Valley: Pippin—7:30 p.m. March 25, 26, 27—$12/$10 advance/$5 seniors, kids—845-577-6544

Albertus Magnus: Back to the ‘80s: The Totaly Awesome Musical—7 p.m. March 26, 27; 2 p.m. March 28—$12.50 advance/$15.50 door—www.showtix4u.com

Sleepy Hollow: Footloose—7:30 p.m. April 9, 10; 2 p.m. April 10—$8/$5 students—914-332-6223

Horace Greeley: Return to Forbidden Planet—7 p.m. April 15; 8 p.m. April 16; 2 and 8 p.m. April 17—$20—914-861-9400

Ossining: Beauty and the Beast—4 p.m. April 15; 7 p.m. April 16, 17; 2 p.m. April 18—Free, donations accepted—914-762-5760

Eastchester: Footloose—7:30 p.m. April 16, 17; 2 p.m. April 18—  $12/$8; April 18, $6 seniors, kids—914-793-6130, ext. 4477

Hastings: Show to be announced—7:30 p.m. April 16; 7 p.m. April 17; 2 p.m., April 18—$10/$8/seniors free—914-478-6206

Rockland Country Day: Return to Forbidden Planet—7 p.m. April 16, 17; 2 p.m. April 17, 18—$10 in advance/$12 at the door—845-268-6802

New Rochelle: Big River—8 p.m. April 22, 23, 24; 2 p.m. April 25—$10/$7—914-576-4500

Rye: Putnam County Spelling Bee—7 p.m. April 22; 8 p.m. April 23; 2 and 8 p.m. April 24—$10/$5 students/seniors free—914-967-6100

Stepinac: The Drowsy Chaperone—7:30 p.m. April 23, 24, 30, May 1, 2; 3 p.m. May 2—$15/$12 seniors, kids under 12—914-946-4800

Lakeland: Thoroughly Modern Millie—8 p.m. April 23; 2 and 8 p.m. April 24—$10, $8 in advance—jenslhome@aol.com

Pearl River: The Music Man—7 p.m. April 23, 24—$10, $8 seniors and pre-sale—845-620-3801

Putnam Valley: Crazy for You—8 p.m. April 23, 24; 2 p.m. April 25—$5845-526-7847, ext. 1369

Sacred Heart: Guys & Dolls—8 p.m. April 23, 24; 2 p.m. April 25—$10/$8—914-965-6953

Iona Prep: Swinging on a Star—7:30 p.m. April 29, 30, May 1 —$12/$8 students—At the door

Peekskill: Into the Woods—7:30 p.m. April 30, May 1; 12:30 p.m. May 1—$12/$8 students/$5 seniors, kids—914-263-9483

Port Chester: Good Man, Charlie Brown—8 p.m. April 30 and May 1; 2 p.m. May 2—$10/$8—914-934-7900

Walter Panas: 42nd Street—  8 p.m. May 7, 8—$10—914-739-2823, ext. 555

Benny Van Buren — the manager of the hapless Washington Senators in the musical “Damn Yankees” — has plenty of heart, but he just can’t seem to spur his team on to victory over the Bronx Bombers.

Then, out of nowhere, comes Joe Hardy, a slugger who leads the Senators out of the doldrums and whips them into pennant-winning form.

Surprise.

Out of nowhere.

Penelope Cruz knows how Benny feels. While the theater program at White Plains High certainly wasn’t in the doldrums, far from it, the musical director was pleasantly surprised when a group of seniors who had never been in a show strolled into auditions for “Damn Yankees” and won roles as members of the Senators team.

She calls them her “surprise seniors.”

One is Ben Gartenberg, 17, (inset, in a photo by Angela Gaul of The Journal News) who has been an outfielder on the White Plains baseball team, although he’s taking this year off.

“I just did it on a whim, I guess, for the social experience,” he says. “I like music and singing.”

He’s not entirely sure if his character’s name is Brian or Bryant, but he knows he’s in plenty of songs: “You Gotta Have Heart,” “Shoeless Joe,” “Two Lost Souls,” “The Game” and “Who’s Got the Pain?”

He may have surprised Cruz by showing up, but “Damn Yankees” has had some surprises for him.

“I learned that the ensemble has to work harder than I thought they did,” he says. “You have to come to twice as many rehearsals as the leads.”

The lefty has also had to learn to throw righty, since the prop baseball gloves Cruz found were all made for righties.

“Musical-theater baseball is nothing like real baseball,” Gartenberg adds.

Bobby Leight, 16, another surprise senior, plays Vernon, one of the Senators.

“I just wanted the experience,” he says. “I know a lot of people who have been in the musical. Friends have been telling me for a couple of years to do it.”

Leight says his more experienced castmates have said the theatrical neophytes have “filled in really well.”

“We did what we were supposed to and got all the dances down,” he says, adding that he and his fellow Senators have developed an approach to this acting thing.

“We all talk in really bad accents, on and off the stage,” he says. “I think we also did that to avoid getting yelled at for talking too loud, because she can never quite identify who’s saying what, because we all have the same bad accent.”

Senior Paul Bronzo says he’s been working on a Boston accent, “which doesn’t make sense, because we’re the Washington Senators, but, hey, it’s baseball.”

Matt Hanley, 17, a senior, plays Henry, another ballplayer. He says he was surprised by “the amount of dancing that baseball players do.”

The high-energy “Shoeless Joe” number (inset, in an Angela Gaul photo) — in which a female reporter starts to spin the story of the soon-to-be-great Joe Hardy — is “very fast, very energetic and overall tiring,” Hanley says.

C.J. Shepard, 17, is an always-been-there senior, appearing in all the musicals. Last year, he was Benny Southstreet in “Guys & Dolls.” This year, he’s manager Benny Van Buren.

“I had no expectations” for the surprise seniors, he says, drawing laughter from the team. “I didn’t think ‘Oh, they’re going to be horrible,’ or ‘They’re going to be good.’ I thought they would just kind of be extra people in the cast, but they’ve proved to be more than that. They’ve actually turned out to be really good.”

Jesse Basson, 17, another surprise senior, is in the show alongside his brother, sophomore Adam Basson.

“The people are cool. It’s something to do, besides homework and the Internet,” he says. “It keeps me active.”

“Before the auditions, we came in for music rehearsals to learn the songs, so I assumed the auditions were going to be ridiculous and really rigorous. But in the end, everything came through nicely and it turned out to be a lot chiller than I thought it would be.”

If you go

What: “Damn Yankees”

Where: White Plains High School, 550 North St., White Plains.

When: 7:30 p.m., Feb. 5, 6; 3 p.m., Feb. 7.

Tickets: $10; $5 students and seniors

Call: 914-422-2234.

With: Rachel Annunziata, Melodie Badillo, Nikki Barber, Adam Basson, Jesse Basson, Rachel Benjamin, Eli Bernstein, Paul Bronzo, Emily Brotmann, Ali Brotmann, Seann Cantatore, Isabella DeLisi, Samantha Eisenberg, Donya Feizbakhsh, Ben Gartenberg, Remy Gautreau, Klara Gribetz, Matthew Hanley, Nadine Hofgaertner, Alexandra Imbrosci, Antony Kalathara, Bobby Leight, Ty Matsushita, Sean McGee, Erynn McLeod, Meaghan McLeod, Laura Pellegrini, Daniel Petralia, Holly Petre, Garrett Pfisterer, Alexandra Reynolds, Madeline Rogan, Jens Sannerud, Stephanie Sheehan, CJ Shepard, Jimmy Sorrow, Griffin Taylor, Luke Taylor, Nicole Barnes, Olivia Bellantoni, Maci Bianco, Caroline Blaney, Gigi Brady, Shaina Brady, Jake Carmen, Jalen Chapman, Brandon Clayton, Brian Doyle, Hannah Gamiel, Andrew Hall, Alex Harelick, Mariana Hess, Chris Keeler, Khalilah Lushiku, Christine Mann, Ariel Miller, Pazia Miller, Katharine Murphy, Annie Oddo, Travis Petre, Mitchell Pozo, David Romero, Alexandra Sampugnaro, Amanda Simmons, Alannah Smith, Neal Tangonan, Satchel Tangonan, Anna Tiburzi, Andrew Baritz, Neal Beeken, Clair Cangialosi, Victoria Corbalis, Hannah Fine, Edward Gonzalez, Adam Jaffe, Robert Maida, Emily Moses, Holger Moustakas, Brendan Oates, Tristan Pagliari, Mackenzie Rudis, Jacki Wing, Sylvie Zackrone, Juliana Marothy, Vivian Noriega-Vernon

Building Character: Watch Bobby Leight and Matt Hanley — two of the “surprise seniors” — talk about how they get into character at www.lohud.com/highschoolmusicals.

Follow Peter D. Kramer: He’s going to be all over the map from now till May. Find out when he’ll be near you. Follow him at www.twitter.com/peterkramer.

My High School Musical: Three high-school seniors will take us along for a ride as they prepare to appear in their final high-school musicals. Read blog posts from Harrison’s Marisa Urgo, Stepinac’s Doug Daniels and Rockland Country Day School’s Tim Bidon at mymusical.lohudblogs.com.

When the curtain opens at the Tarrytown Music Hall at 1 p.m. tomorrow, Max Levy will do something that nobody thought he’d be able to do just a few weeks ago: He’ll play The Beast in Random Farms Kids’ Theater’s production of “Disney’s Beauty and the Beast.”

When he was cast last June, few doubted that Max, an eighth-grader at H.C. Crittenden Middle School in Armonk, could handle the role. He had convinced producer Anya Wallach and director Marc Tumminelli he could act, sing and move.

But when he showed up for the first rehearsal on Jan. 4, Max was in a wheelchair.

The Pleasantville 13-year-old had been laid low by complications from a summer-time bout with H1N1 influenza.

He contracted the flu at summer camp in Maine. He got word that he was cast as The Beast while he was in the camp’s infirmary where, to break up the monotony, Max would read the script aloud over and over, at the request of his fellow infirmary mates.

After the influenza, there was pneumonia that forced him to miss the start of the school year. He soon began to lose feeling in his toes, then his calves and knees and soon thereafter, his thighs. He grew increasingly weak and was in considerable pain.

The summer and fall were a blur of debilitating migraines, doctor visits and tests, including a spinal tap, three MRIs, and a test called an EMG, in which needles are inserted into muscles to detect electrical impulses and diagnose muscle weakness.

Unable to navigate stairs without getting dizzy and unable to stand without extreme headaches, Max swapped his upstairs bedroom for his parents’ ground-floor room. He worked to keep up with his studies, but weakened easily.

All the while, he had his mind on Jan. 4, 2010, the start of rehearsals for “Beauty and the Beast.”

He did physical therapy with Yossi Taubenfeld at White Plains Hospital, who helped Max deal with the physical challenges, but also the emotional turmoil he was experiencing. When you’re an active 13-year-old, a highly rated tennis player, and you lose the use of your legs, it takes an emotional toll.

Eventually, after diagnoses, tests and more diagnoses, Max came to the attention of Dr. David Younger, chief of neuromuscular diseases at NYU Langone Medical Center.

The doctor, who lives in Scarsdale, looked at the tests and ordered a few more. He came to the diagnosis of peripheral neuropathy and dysautonomia. Max’s nerves, weakened by the original infection, were under seige.

Younger put Max on intravenous gamma globulin, which allowed his body to begin to repairing itself.

Still, on Jan. 4, there Max was in that wheelchair, one of 120 kids in four different casts of “Beauty and the Beast.”

Producer Wallach knew that an actor in a wheelchair could certainly play The Beast, but if she were to go that route, she’d have to put all three of the boys who play the Beast in wheelchairs.

The set — with six stairs up from the Music Hall stage — had already been built. There was also the matter of the steps backstage that give access to the stage.

And there was the time factor.

“While we didn’t see anything wrong with having our leading man in a wheelchair, we knew we didn’t have enough time to re-block the show so that Max could move around the stage safely,” Wallach says.

All those factors meant Wallach needed a Beast who could walk. And, in the show’s climactic scene, set to the title song, the Beast would have to waltz.

“I felt like everything in my life was taken away from me due to this illness,” Max says. “I couldn’t stand losing one more thing, especially since I had been looking forward to playing the Beast since before the summer.”

“I was very emotional, and not very happy,” Max recalls. “I asked Anya ‘How long are you going to give me to walk?’”

Wallach looked at the schedule and told Max that they’d need to make a decision — if he could play the part or have another actor go on for him — by Jan. 18.

Max had two weeks to get out of the wheelchair, walk and, eventually, waltz.

With the help of medication, physical therapy and a looming deadline he wanted to meet, Max made changes.

“The next two rehearsals, I showed up with a walker,” he says. “Then on crutches. Every single day?that I was walking, the next day got easier.”

All the while, he was watching rehearsals, watching scenes being staged, watching other actors do what he couldn’t yet do:?move effortlessly around the stage.

Max’s parents drove him to the JCC at Mid-Westchester in Scarsdale, where he trained in the pool to build up the strength in his legs.

Eventually, he was able to stand on the stage and rehearse.

“At one rehearsal, I remember, I started crying,”?he says, his voice catching at the memory, “because I was thinking I’d never be able to do this.”

Sarah Rossman, 13, of Harrison, who’ll be Max’s Belle, says she’s amazed by her co-star’s progress.

“I had swine flu over the summer, but I was better within a week”?she says. “We all felt terribly that he wouldn’t be able to do it. But he tried so hard. He was always watching and learning.

“You see a kid in a wheelchair and you think ‘It’s not going to happen,’” she says. “He’s not going to be able to waltz.”

But there he’ll be, tomorrow and Sunday at 1 p.m.

Late in the show, Max Levy and Sarah Rossman will waltz.

“I can dance better now than before I got sick,”?he says with a grin. “Because I couldn’t dance before.”

“The reason that he’s walking and dancing now is that the medicine kicked in in the nick of time,” Younger says.

The doctor says that Max’s recovery continues — he still can’t feel his toes and there are other areas that must be healed — but Younger concedes that there is such a thing as incentivization, in which the mind, setting its sights on a goal, can play a role in healing.

“The mind and the body work so closely together that you reach a threshhold where you pull it together. Knowing that he was standing out of the chair when I saw him Jan. 8 and I said to him ‘You can do it,’ I?think probably helped him pull it together. A kid sometimes can’t do that unless they’re motivated.”

But Younger knows where to place the credit, on the young actor who, this afternoon and tomorrow at about 2:30, will be taking a bow with his cast.

“He did this all on his own,” he says.

(Here’s a video of Max and Sarah, waltzing at rehearsal:)

If you go

What: “Beauty and the Beast”

When: Max Levy performs the role of The Beast at 1 p.m. Jan. 30 and 31.

Where: Tarrytown Music Hall, 13 Main St., Tarrytown

Tickets: $18, $16 children/seniors, $14 groups of 20 or more.

Call: 877-840-0457

Web: www.randomfarms.com.

(Photo by Anya Wallach; video by Peter D. Kramer)