'Tuck Everlasting' adaptation marks Pittsburgh writer's latest N.Y. debut

Pittsburgh's Tim Federle sips slowly from the Fountain of Youth, while imbibing a gimlet of gin with a twist of wry.

Such is the intoxicating cocktail of careers that have stirred and shaken the publishing world since this erstwhile professional dancer bounded onto the book scene five years ago with a series of children's works — “Better Nate Than Ever” and “Five, Six, Seven, Nate!” about a Broadway-besotted youngster, and the just-released “The Great American Whatever,” his first novel take on young adulthood.

He threw in a mixologist's recipe for glory with “Tequila Mockingbird: Cocktails With a Literary Twist,” “Hickory Daiquiri Dock: Cocktails With a Nursery Rhyme Twist” and “Gone With the Gin: Cocktails With a Hollywood Twist.”

Federle now faces the Big Gulp: Broadway.

The former dancer has traded tap shoes for tapping out the book of “Tuck Everlasting” with co-writer Claudia Shear. The much-anticipated musical is an adaptation of Natalie Babbitt's classic 1975 saga about endless life and love. The show starts previews March 31, with an opening April 26 at the Broadhurst Theatre in New York.

The Pittsburgh native, 35, has had a longtime love of the Broadway scene, he says, ever since he was a kid growing up in Upper St. Clair, and his parents took him Downtown to see tours of “Cats” and “The Secret Garden.”

Federle found his niche at places like CLO Academy, the Center for Theater Arts in Mt. Lebanon and Pittsburgh Musical Theatre. But, as a 13-year-old, he had to deal with some students who bullied him. Federle will not forget the first tight spot he was in as a kid.

“I was wearing tights because I was going to appear in a production of ‘Cats,' ” he says, when a classmate from middle school teased him. Embarrassed, Federle dropped out of the production. Looking back, he wishes he would have handled it differently.

“I couldn't land a punch,” he says, “but I could land a punch line.”

It is a rare sore spot in an otherwise blemish-free bonanza of achievements that have led to his Broadway bow as a librettist.

“My parents are so happy,” he chuckles. “They thought I'd grow up and live in their attic.”

He was influenced early on by the cultural scene in Pittsburgh.

“There were so many artistic opportunities there,” he says. “I mean, you can't swing a cat in Pittsburgh without hitting a tenor.”

The tenor of the times dictated, however, that he move on.

“I had an amazing counselor at Upper St. Clair High School,” he says in praise of Marian Orr. “She told me, ‘You're a terrible student, but you have big dreams.' ”

If his academic prowess was a nightmare of nonsense — “I was always joking around in class” — his talents spawned some smart moves. To fulfill his phys ed requirements, for example, “I was allowed to take dance during my junior and senior years. My parents would drive me to Point Park College (now University), where I would take dance classes with college students.”

Federle was accepted at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, but, to his disappointment, not at Carnegie Mellon University.

“I convinced my parents to let me give New York City a shot for a year,” he says, instead of spending the money in Cincinnati.

Mike and Lynne Federle got a great return on their investment. They foot the bills while their son was dazzling with his footwork, landing jobs in a variety of Broadway shows, including “Gypsy” with Bernadette Peters, “Disney's The Little Mermaid” and the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes.

But, at age 30, Federle started looking elsewhere to shine. The one-time choreo-graphy coach of Broadway's “Billy Elliot,” who mentored the musical's younger dancers, stepped back for a reappraisal of his life and shifted direction, making book on his wit and wordplay. Taking up a pen, he unleashed his pent-up proclivity for humor and hijinks.

And, yes, it was “Better Nate Than Ever.”

Introducing the character of a Pittsburgh boy with dreams of Broadway hit home for Federle, who dispatched his literary doppelganger to audition for the Broadway production of “E.T.: The Musical” and whose further exploits mirrored the writer's own fascination with a life in which the chorus line is king.

It's funny, says the very funny writer:“When I was growing up in Pittsburgh, I never thought of myself as a writer; more as the ham in the corner.”

Federle's writing reflects the performer he has been since playing the role of joker in school.

Now, he's turning the page on his career once more with his debut as a Broadway librettist.

“It's all come full circle,” he says, recalling being taken to New York by his parents to see his first Broadway show, “Beauty and the Beast,” starring Terrence Mann as Javert. Now he's writing the book for “Tuck Everlasting” — starring Mann as the musical's menacing villain.

Federle reads even more significance into his current project, recalling how “Tuck Everlasting” “was the first book I ever finished as an assigned class reading,” he says of his less-than-sterling studies at Fort Couch Middle School in Upper St. Clair.

Federle's newest book, “The Great American Whatever” is a look at teen years teeming with anxiety, his first effort in the Young Adult field. It catches the author at his wry best. It also catches him at his most soulful: The novel is dedicated to Ellie Batz, a high-school classmate who died in a car accident.

“Until then,” he says, “I hadn't known anybody who died. To go to the funeral — to see her in the open casket — gave me a sense of mortality, gave me a sense of urgency in life.”

Coming face-to-face with life's ephemeral nature affected him deeply, sparking a need to share his insight with others who might take life's gifts for granted.

It is somewhat ironic, Federle acknowledges, that — with its dedication to Ellie Batz and the impact she had on his life — “The Great American Whatever” debuts just as “Tuck Everlasting,” with its impressions of immortality, is about to open.

“There are so many big questions,” reasons Federle of the musical's focus on appreciating life for what it offers now.

Federle certainly does — and so does his alter ego. Look at that, he says: “Nate has finally made it to Broadway.”

Michael Elkin is Tribune-Review contributing writer.