THERE WILL ALWAYS BE 'BUDDY' SOURCE} BY REED JOHNSON STAFF WRITER.

Like the Southern-gothic novels of William Faulkner or the magisterial westerns of John Ford, the propulsive roots rock of Buddy Holly has often been best appreciated on the far side of the Atlantic.

In fact, says actor Van Zeiler, who plays the title role in ``Buddy ... The Buddy Holly Story,'' the Texas-born rock 'n' roll pioneer's music is still packing them in across the pond.

``I think he was one of the first and only early rock guys to tour over there,'' explains Zeiler, recently returned from London, where ``Buddy'' has been running continuously for the past 10 years. In London, Zeiler and other cast members were actually on a first-name basis with members of the local Buddy Holly Fan Club, who regularly attended the show.

``It's just like the Who are bigger over here than over there,'' Zeiler says, drawing a parallel with the British rock band.

Over here, over there, or most anywhere rock 'n' roll is played, Holly's legacy still casts a long shadow, and his best tunes still can make people sway.

Starting this Wednesday, Feb. 2 - exactly 41 years to the day since Holly gave his last fateful concert performance many of those seminal Holly hits, including ``Peggy Sue,'' ``Maybe Baby'' and ``That'll Be the Day'' will reverberate inside the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, where ``Buddy'' will play an 11-day engagement. The musical play, which opened in London's West End in 1989 and later had a successful Broadway run, is currently on a national tour that has been winning strong notices.

Zeiler, 27, will take the stage in geeky glasses and white short-sleeve shirt to re-create the legend of a performer whose meteoric career ended abruptly in an Iowa plane crash in the early morning hours of Feb. 3, 1959.

While making himself look like Holly is a relatively easy task, Zeiler's real challenge is replicating the singer's magnetic stage aura.

``He was always willing to take things a step further and incorporate crazy things that other people couldn't envision,'' says Zeiler, speaking by phone from a Fort Worth hotel.

Crazy things such as?

``Standing on the basses and having bass players twirl things around, and sliding around on his knees,'' Zeiler continues. ``Crazy stuff like that - crazy considering that rock 'n' roll and rockabilly stuff was just starting around that time. Elvis was just starting to swivel his hips, and Chuck Berry was just starting to duck walk. But I think Buddy's (theatricality) wasn't so much calculated performance as a youthful exuberance.''

Holly's craziness ... er, youthful exuberance, also extended to his personal life: He proposed to his future wife on the night of their first date.

Holly also became one of the first white performers to play the Apollo Theatre in New York, one of many unconventional experiences that he packed into his brief 22 years.

``He was definitely moving ahead - all the time - at the time that he died,'' Zeiler says. ``People who knew him said it was as if he knew he had a limited time and he wanted to get it all in. He had no time to fool around in the recording studio. He was notorious for being able to get things down in a few takes.''

Born Charles Hardin Holley (with an ``e'') on Sept. 7, 1936, in Lubbock, Texas, Holly and his band, the Crickets, brought a number of innovations to early rock, including the use of double-tracking and the basic lineup of two guitars, bass and drums.

Holly also penned original material at a time when other proto-rockers were content doing souped-up covers of country and blues tunes.

He helped popularize such now-familiar techniques as the percussive rhythmic strumming of guitar chords (on ``Peggy Sue,'' for example) and at the time of his death had begun incorporating orchestral textures into his arrangements.

``I think the key to it all is that it was ground-breaking at the time,'' Zeiler says.

Zeiler's path to playing Buddy Holly also traversed unfamiliar ground.

Growing up in an Atlanta household of music enthusiasts, Zeiler began playing classical violin at age 3. His parents, he says, fell in that generation between Elvis and the Beatles, limiting his youthful exposure to pop music.

But as an adolescent, he developed a taste for progressive Southern rock by the likes of Jimmy Buffett, Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Allman Brothers. Later, he played in a college band, Southern Exposure.

After moving to New York City to pursue an acting career, he managed to pay some bills by playing acoustic guitar at ``yuppie bars'' during happy hour. While he ``never really intended on a career in music,'' and still doesn't, Zeiler partly credits his years on the cocktail circuit with building the stamina he needs to play Buddy.

One unexpected residual of ``Buddy'' was meeting his wife, Victoria Stilwell, the British actress who portrays Holly's wife, Maria Elena. While the couple are enjoying the chance to share the same stage, Zeiler says, they avoid bringing their work home with them.

``We've sort of done it long enough now, Vicki and I, that we keep our other interests.''

Though Zeiler is unsure how long he'll keep playing the role, his interest in Buddy Holly seems in no immediate danger of fading away. In some ways, he suggests, the entire world is still catching up with the skinny kid from Lubbock.

``It seems, from reading the history of it, that his loss wasn't really felt and his stuff really appreciated for its place in the history of things until history had moved on and was able to look back.''

THE FACTS

--What: ``Buddy ... The Buddy Holly Story.''

--Where: Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood.

--When: Wednesday through Feb. 13. Performances at 8 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sundays; additional performance 2 p.m. Feb. 3.

--Tickets: $22 to $52. Call [phone]; ticketmaster.com on the Web.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, box

Photo: (1) Van Zeiler taps into the "crazy stuff'' he sees in the influential rocker in "Buddy...The Buddy Holly Story.''

(2) no caption (Buddy Holly)

Box: THE FACTS (see text)