In the month between Thanksgiving and today, it's been all about the anticipation. Shopping, planning. Getting ready. Today, the buildup is about to explode.

Tomorrow's the day -- Christmas. Meeting, greeting, eating. Collapsing. Tuesday, we may do a little shopping, grabbing marked-down gift wrap, lights and such for next year.

But come Wednesday -- Dec. 27 -- is anybody going to be interested in something called "White Christmas"?

"Absolutely," says David Armstrong, producing artistic director of Seattle's 5th Avenue Theatre, which developed this stage version of the classic movie.

"It's a big, tap-dancing extravaganza, jampacked with Irving Berlin tunes. Who wouldn't want to see that?" asks Armstrong, who is co-director and co- choreographer (with Jamie Rocco) of the production that opens here Wednesday.

"Although the plot revolves around the holiday, it's not just about it," Armstrong says in a telephone interview from his home base.

"When I hear the word 'Christmas,' it brings up two thoughts -- one is the religious holiday, obviously, and the other is the idea of family and sharing and caring," says Rocco in a separate interview from New York.

"The thing that strikes me," Rocco says, "is how Irving Berlin managed to articulate what the idea of the American family holiday is all about."

Unlike many musicals that were originally written for the stage and then became movies, "White Christmas" had never been on the stage until 2004. It was first produced as a play three seasons ago in San Francisco. It was repeated -- again around the holiday -- in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Boston. This year, it is being presented in Seattle and Sacramento; next year, it will be done in Denver; and, after that, Houston.

"All the theaters want to have it during the holidays," Armstrong says, "although we think of it as timeless. It's an old- fashioned song-and-dance show, and there aren't a lot of those."

Rocco describes it as "spectacular, glittery, a very 1950s musical."

The difference between a piece for the stage and one for the screen is vast, Armstrong says.

"They're very different animals. The authors (David Ives and Paul Blake) have taken the essence of the movie but they've not put the movie directly on the stage because that usually doesn't work. The creators of the movie (Norman Krasna, Norman Panama and Melvin Frank) were all people who had written for the stage, so we tried to channel the thoughts of the original writers and work backward: What would it have been like if it had been written for the stage first?"

As the man most responsible for the choreography, Rocco says he recognized the challenge of living up to dancing created for the 1954 film by Robert Alton. "I never go into a show thinking I'm going to do it the way someone else did, but I did say (during development) that I was trying to channel Robert Alton.

"I have a great appreciation for the evolution of theater dance," says Rocco, who started tap dancing at 3, was a child actor in New York at 6 and directed his first play there at 16. "I've always studied great choreographers, and I like to think I can distinguish what Alton would do if he were doing this on the stage."

Armstrong says his goal with the play "is to make it be in the period but not feel old. Most of the show is set in 1954. The prologue is set 10 years earlier -- and we want to give a feel of the time and place of a world that is very different than the one we live in today.

"It has the atmosphere of a show from 1954 and the energy of a show from today," he says.

"It is about nostalgia," Rocco says. "It's about nostalgia and family, about America and the way we help our fellow man -- but not at all as sappy as that sounds. It taps into a real, seminal human emotion."


10 REASONS TO SEE 'WHITE CHRISTMAS' THE MUSICAL

1. The title song, obviously. It was written for and first appeared in the 1942 film "Holiday Inn" and won the 1943 Academy Award for best original song.

2. The jobs it provides (21 musicians, a cast of about 30 singers, dancers and actors, and 40 or so people backstage).

3. It's from the same production company that brought us "Singin' in the Rain" last year.

4. Familiar faces. Directors David Armstrong and Jamie Rocco have long histories directing Music Circus productions, and the leads -- Michael Gruber and Christina Saffran Ashford -- also are familiar from the tent and had the leads in "Rain" last year.

5. The "spectacular" scenery and costumes (250 of 'em) from the original San Francisco production.

6. The song "Count Your Blessings."

7. And "I Love a Piano."

8. And "I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm."

9. Not to mention "The Best Things Happen While You're Dancing."

10. Snow! In the theater! Honest.