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Keith Brown recalls his very first audition for Prince George's Little Theatre. The year was 1979 and the production was "Harvey," playwright Mary Chase's tale of an affable average Joe and his friendship with a 6-foot, invisible rabbit.

"I didn't get the part," Brown says.

Nonetheless, he got hopping.

"I've been with the company ever since," he says. "I've done scene and set design, acting — and I've directed for the company for a little over 20 years."

On Friday, "Harvey" heads back to Prince George's County, with Brown leading the way.

"We just celebrated our 50th year. This is the theater's 51st season," Brown says. "And I thought it might be kind of nice to do "Harvey," which, ironically, was the 50th production PGLT ever did."

This time around, the show will be held at the Bowie Playhouse, where the company has staged all productions since 2006. With a seating capacity of 150, the Little Theatre is hoping parents bring their entire herd.

"It's good for all ages," Brown says of Chase's humorous and touching yarn. "It's a classic. It's timeless. It's set in 1946, but it really could be set in just about any era."

The stage play was famously adapted for the silver screen in 1950 starring the inimitable James Stewart as the hapless hero, Elwood P. Dowd. While it's this version, perhaps, that mainstream audiences are most familiar with, Brown notes that he resisted revisiting the film prior to production.

"I tried not to. I do love the film. It's one of my favorites, actually," he says, noting that the plot and dialogue of the film do faithfully adhere to the play. Still, he explains, "I wanted to come up with things that were not there."

"That's the interesting thing about theater," he says. "An actor can read the same line, the same scene, and interpret it in a totally different way. That's why people love to get into acting. That's what's great about live theater. You're able to give a fresh look to [things]."

Leading Brown's cast as Elwood is actor Mike O'Donnell, who himself has a storied history with the giant rabbit.

"I first saw a production of ‘Harvey' when I was 10 years old, when my older sister was performing in a college production," says O'Donnell, now 44, of Washington, D.C. "I can also remember my parents taking me to see the Jimmy Stewart movie at a young age, and from that moment on, I knew I wanted to play that role someday. I just had to grow up first."

O'Donnell, who teaches religion at Baltimore's Mount Saint Joseph High School, says he has been involved in theater since the eighth grade. Growing up in Bowie, he recalls his parents taking him to see a staging of "Guys and Dolls" at the Playhouse. He studied drama in college and has enjoyed an on-again, off-again relationship with community theater ever since. Ten years ago, he discovered the PGLT via a production of "12 Angry Men."

But landing the role of Elwood P. Dowd has been a dream come true.

"In my heart, that's what I was going for," he says regarding auditions. "But I was open to anything. There are no bad characters in this show. But to play Elwood was icing on the cake."

For O'Donnell, acting begins with the mastery of lines — and experimenting with them.

"One of the techniques I use is to think of someone I know," he says. "I think, ‘How would they do this? How would they say this line?' So it's largely a composite of people I know or celebrities."

All celebrities save for Mr. Stewart.

"I haven't watched [the movie] since before auditioning for the role, and I kind of regret doing that now," O'Donnell says. "Now I have Jimmy Stewart in my head. And I'm trying not to do Jimmy Stewart."

While Stewart's presence in O'Donnell's psyche poses a small hurdle to overcome — more important is the 6-foot, imaginary rabbit in the room.

"What's difficult is remembering how high he is," O'Donnell says of Harvey. "I have to pick a focal point. It's difficult to remember that he's on stage with me. But through practice, I've gotten accustomed to it."

"Believe it or not," he says, "I feel him interacting with me now."

The nice thing? Harvey is always on time for rehearsals, which Brown says began in earnest around Thanksgiving, contending with holiday scheduling and weather-related cancellations.

Luckily, the cast — which, in addition to O'Donnell, includes Millie Ferrara, Heather Harris, Rachel Simms, Peyton Johns, Rich and Sherry Fogg, Danny Brooks, Eliot Malmuth, Shirley Greenwald and Patrick Ready — is close-knit, with many members sharing a 20-year history and welcoming a handful of newcomers to the fold.

"I also have some old friends — Rose English and Dan Lavanga — helping me out behind the scenes," says Brown. "They're the people you don't see on stage, but without them, you don't have a show."

Unseen, but no less important? Sounds familiar.

"I've heard some productions had actors in rabbit suits, but I wanted to leave it to the audience to see Harvey as they see him," says Brown. "And anyone who believes in Harvey can see him."

That said, artist Diane Hutchison provided a portrait, which will be shown briefly during the show.

"It's a marvelous painting of Elwood and Harvey. That will be [his] first appearance," Brown says. "And I have to say, it looks just like both of them."

noravec@gazette.net

"Harvey"

-When: 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays through Feb. 26

-Where: Bowie Playhouse, 16500 White Marsh Park Drive, Bowie

-Tickets: $19 for adults, $14 for seniors and individuals 18 and younger

-For information:

301-937-7458 (PGLT);

www.pglt.org