Gonna dance a mile in Fred and Ginger’s shoes

Noah Racey and Nancy Lemenager want to be very clear on one point, in case they get off on the wrong foot: He’s no Fred Astaire and she’s no Ginger Rogers.

They may often look like the classic dynamic duo on a Broadway stage, crooning happily to each other and sweeping effortlessly in an elegant fox-trot, snuggled in each other’s well-tailored arms.

But no.

“We’re not playing them and we’re not trying to be them,” Lemenager says as she and Racey gear up to headline a performance of “Never Gonna Dance,” a stage adaptation of the 1936 Fred-and-Ginger movie “Swing Time.”

“It’s always been an homage to them but not a reproduction -- out of respect to them,” agrees Racey. “We’re in the footsteps of a pair of amazing performers.”

Fred and Ginger aren’t the only big names hovering over the production: It’s directed by Michael Greif, who helmed “Rent”; it’s choreographed by Jerry Mitchell, who also did “Hairspray”; and it features music by Jerome Kern, of “Show Boat” fame.

There are only two no-names billed high in the production -- Racey and Lemenager.

Snuggled in Racey’s candlelit dressing room for an interview at the Broadhurst Theatre, the pair of 33-year-olds are keenly aware that “Never Gonna Dance” represents their star turn, the culmination of years hoofing and singing in relative obscurity.

“It’s unheard of to get this,” Racey admits, reaching for a handful of M&Ms.; “People are so eager to put a big name in things and they can’t dance or they can’t act in this kind of style,” Racey continues. “It’s humbling and it’s exciting and it’s what we’ve been doing for 10, 15 years.”

“Never Gonna Dance” -- the title comes from an early version of the movie’s name -- tells the story of John “Lucky” Garnett, a professional hoofer who arrives in New York to prove his worth to his fiancee by trying to earn $25,000 without dancing. He fails, miserably, on both counts, getting embroiled in a dance contest and falling in love with a dance teacher played by Lemenager.

“It’s a love story that doesn’t involve greed and sex and violence,” says Lemenager. “There’s a sense of escapism.”

While the story mimics the movie’s love-will-conquer-all script, producers of “Never Gonna Dance” made sure Racey and Lemenager’s dance steps didn’t ape those of Astaire and Rogers in “Swing Time.”

“We’re trying to bring the essence of what they did together, which is, to me, two people with really distinct personalities that have this spark and this energy between them that you can’t quite describe and you don’t quite know why it works,” Lemenager says. “And I think that we’ve just been able to find it in our own way and not try to feel like we’re trying to be Fred and Ginger.”