ACTRESS TAKING SHOW ON ROAD; VALENCIA TEEN HEADING TO DENVER WITH `RAGTIME' CAST.

Byline: Mary Schubert Daily News Staff Writer

After months of singing ragtime, Amy Carrey recently crooned another old standard for an audience of 36,452. The teen-age actress, touring with a Tony Award-winning musical, used center field as her stage.

Before the umpires shouted ``Play ball!'' at Wednesday's game between the Dodgers and Florida Marlins, Carrey sang ``The Star Spangled Banner.'' Accompanied by the Dodger Stadium organist, her face projected on the jumbo scoreboard in left field, Carrey hit all the notes of a song that has confounded singers for years.

She even felt confident enough to add a nifty high note toward the end - ``O'er the land of the freeeeeeeeeee!!'' - stamping her own style on the National Anthem.

Carrey, 14, has been enjoying a whirlwind vacation back home in Valencia before she reports to Denver for a six-week run of ``Ragtime,'' the musical adaptation of E.L. Doctorow's 1975 novel about America at the dawn of the 20th century.

``Ragtime'' made its American debut in Los Angeles last year, and Carrey was an understudy for that production - taking the stage only once during its 10-month run at the Shubert Theatre.

But then Carrey was tapped for the national touring company and it was off to Washington, D.C., for four months of shows that wrapped Aug. 7. This time she wasn't the one waiting in the wings; this time Carrey was the one onstage, performing eight shows a week for audiences that even included President Clinton, the first lady and Vice President Al Gore.

``Ragtime'' opens Wednesday in the Mile-High City, where the crew will keep tanks of oxygen backstage at the Temple Buell Theatre for cast members who aren't used to Denver's thin air. The musical will be in town for six weeks before moving on to Minneapolis, Seattle and Boston.

Carrey's not sure if her ``Ragtime'' stint will extend beyond the Sept. 26 close in Denver. When you're 14, you live in the present and enjoy the ride.

Starting high school

This fall, she'll start high school, but right now it's anybody's guess what city that will be in or whether her teachers will be the on-set tutors that Livent Inc., the producers of ``Ragtime,'' provide at the theater. Carrey spent several months of seventh and eighth grades at La Mesa Junior High, before and during the show's Los Angeles engagement.

In her role as The Little Girl, Carrey plays an unnamed Jewish immigrant, part of three families whose lives intersect in ``Ragtime.'' The turn-of-the-century story examines societal changes ranging from the advent of assembly-line technology to racial clashes to the birth of the labor union movement, all set against a backdrop of Scott Joplin-esque music.

``When people ask me: Don't you get bored of doing it every night? I say no, because it's live,'' Carrey said.

Carrey, who turns 15 in December, is no stranger to live theater. Dropping her given surname Carras because it was so often mispronounced, she got her start in TV commercials and productions of ``Evita,'' ``Fiddler on the Roof,'' ``Godspell'' and ``The King and I'' at local playhouses, including the Alex Theater in Glendale, the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza and the Long Beach Civic Light Opera.

In April 1997, she began rehearsals for ``Ragtime'' prior to its Los Angeles run. Months of preparation and waiting for her turn in the spotlight followed, as the primary actress never missed a performance.

Carrey's big moment came last Jan. 28. The producers were choosing the national touring company and wanted to see how she fared in front of a live audience.

``I was just so happy to finally do it. I was so excited,'' Carrey said. ``I wasn't nervous at all. I had, like, 70 guests there watching me, so that was really cool,'' she said.

``I had been ready for a long time, because I had to watch the show at least once a week. So I was ready to go on.''

Clintons in audience

By last March, she was off to New York for cast rehearsals of the Washington run. The only time she felt some jitters was April 26, three days before opening night in the nation's capital, when the Clintons took in a preview show that doubled as a Democratic fund-raiser.

``There were so many security guards everywhere,'' Carrey said. One scene calling for some characters to shoot firearms - loaded with blanks - had to be slightly altered in deference to the commander-in-chief.

``We have guns in the show, and we couldn't point them at the orchestra level at all, because that's where he was sitting,'' Carrey said.

The glare of the footlights made it hard to sneak a peek at the audience during her scenes, but Carrey said she caught a glimpse of the president during her off-stage moments.

Co-star Michael Rupert, who played her father, Tateh, described the show as a bit nerve-wracking because of the heavy Secret Service presence backstage and the metal detectors at the theater doors.

``It actually was a little distracting, because I kept thinking: The president's out there. The leader of the free world is watching the show,'' Rupert said from his Washington, D.C. home.

A veteran stage actor who won a Tony in 1986 for ``Sweet Charity,'' Rupert described his teen co-star as ``professional'' and ``committed'' to the role. ``She's also, quite honestly, very good in the show,'' he said.

Emotional scene

In one scene, the struggling Tateh decides to send The Little Girl to live with another family who can better provide for her. Rupert recalled how Carrey played the emotional scene each night at Washington's National Theatre.

``The tears just flow; Amy really gets into it. I've really been taken by surprise sometimes by her tears,'' he said.

The two will be paired again in Denver, which happens to be Rupert's hometown.

``Amy has just been a delight. I treat her like she's my own kid,'' he said. The girl confided some of her teen-age crushes to him, but that wBas the extent of their offstage father-daughter-like relationship. ``No, I didn't help her with her homework,'' Rupert joked.

On days off from the Washington shows, Amy and fellow cast members had barbecues, took a dinner cruise, visited an amusement park and went sightseeing around the capital. A friend wrangled Carrey a tour of the White House. The night of the Tony Awards in June, the Washington casts of ``Ragtime'' and ``Show Boat'' gathered at a mansion for a viewing party, she said.

And every day, Carrey would board the Metro subways to shuttle between the theater and her apartment in suburban Crystal City, where mother Polly let the teen thespian decorate her room in leopard-skin patterns, her favorite.

One of the things she misses most about the District of Columbia is a local brand of potato chips ``sooooo good'' that she has asked friends to ship a supply to her. Now Carrey said she's ready for a new challenge in Denver. She'll be ready with plenty of cough drops and herbal tea to soothe her throat, and will follow doctors' recommendations to drink lots of water to compensate for the thin air.

The only thing that might tax her voice is chatting with her friends back home. After all, Carrey explains, what kind of teen-age girl would go on the road without her prepaid phone card?

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Photo

PHOTO (Color) Amy Carrey, 14, of Valencia will be heading to Denver soon to join the national touring company of the musical ``Ragtime.'' She recently appeared in the Washington, D.C., production.

John Lazar/Special to the Daily News