KCRW TRANSPORTS LISTENERS TO 'MEAN STREETS USA'.

Byline: Evan Henerson Staff Writer

Why hit the movies or the mall this weekend when you can stay home, turn on the radio and hit the ``Streets'' all at the same time?

Over a nine-hour span Thursday and Friday, listeners to KCRW-FM (89.9) can curl up - via radio or Webcast - with a few good short detective stories. The series ``Mean Streets USA'' will feature works by Elmore Leonard, Walter Moseley, Sue Grafton, Ross Macdonald and Dashiell Hammett. Readers include Stacy Keach, Sharon Lawrence, Harriet Harris, Tate Donovan and Brian Cox.

Robert Egan, former associate artistic director of the Mark Taper Forum, has assembled a group of actors, many of whom he has worked with in plays over the years, to conduct the readings. Since a single performer reads one story - often taking on multiple characters - the experience will more closely resemble a books-on-tape performance than readers' theater.

It's a forum Egan knows with some authority, having worked with BBC Radio Drama patriarch Martin Esslin while in graduate school.

``It's not dissimilar to directing regular theater,'' says Egan, who is collaborating with composer Karl Lundeberg, ``except you take away the body and all the visuals and know that you're painting visuals with language. In this case, I was looking for actors with a kind of daringness.''

Sharon Lawrence, the former ``NYPD Blue'' star, can relate. Having found herself listening to books on tape with greater frequency lately, she cites good friend Cherry Jones' rendering of the Carson McCullers novel ``The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter'' as a vocal tour de force.

``I think it's my favorite work of hers,'' says Lawrence, ``and it's due in no small part to the range that these actors - any actor - has to use to create not just a setting, but characters and relationships between them, when all you have is your voice.''

Lawrence reads ``Karen Makes Out'' featuring Karen Sisco, the U.S. marshal who appeared in ``Out of Sight'' and the ABC series bearing her name. The episode, airing Friday between noon and 5 p.m., features both a love story and a crime.

``It's important to be able to voice each character differently but not in a caricature,'' says Lawrence. ``This takes place in Florida, so there's a range of Southern inflections. Robert's ear is really all I had to know whether there was enough distinction.''

``Mean Streets USA,'' partially funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, airs Thursday from 1 to 5 p.m. and Friday from noon to 5 p.m. and will be Webcast simultaneously on www.kcrw.com. The majority of the collection later will be available later on CD to KCRW members.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

THE SCHEDULE

Thursday

``I'll Be Waiting,'' by Raymond Chandler, read by Dakin Matthews.

``It's a Hard World,'' by Andrew Vachss, read by Kevin Tighe.

``The Parker Shotgun,'' by Sue Grafton, read by Harriet Harris.

``Serpents' Dance,'' by Jim Fusilli, read by Tate Donovan.

``Too Many Have Lived,'' by Dashiell Hammett, read by Brian Cox.

``Find Miriam,'' by Stuart M. Kaminsky, read by Kristoffer Tabori

Friday

``The Angry Man,'' by Ross Macdonald, read by Stacy Keach.

``Karen Makes Out,'' by Elmore Leonard, read by Sharon Lawrence.

``The Dead Their Eyes Implore Us,'' by George P. Pelecanos, read by Tony Plana

``A Tough Case to Figure,'' story by Dick Lochte, read by Jefferson Mays

``Cielo Azul,'' by Michael Connelly, read by John Michael Higgins.

``Silver Lining,'' by Walter Mosley, read by Meshach Taylor.

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Sharon Lawrence will read a detective story as part of ``Mean Streets USA.''

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THE SCHEDULE (see text)