"Bronx Bombers" closes this weekend, and you won't want to miss it in its home stretch.

The show assembles a cast portraying some of New York's finest athletes -- and we went behind the scenes with Casting Director Stephanie Klapper to find out how she chose the actors best suited to these iconic roles. Read our interview below to learn about the casting process and her relationship to this extraordinary play.

StageBuddy: How did you get into casting?

Stephanie Klapper: I was a director and also doing a lot of other work to support my directing -- I worked as a production manager, stage manager, set designer -- and a friend of mine who was also a director heard about an opening for a Casting Director in a small Off-Broadway Theater and he recommended me. I thought it would be a great job for me to meet actors.  What started out as something I did to add to my directing turned into a career. I found what I was strong at as a director was casting and putting people together.

SB: Why would you recommend "Bronx Bombers"?

SK: In a time where it's sometimes very easy to think about ourselves, this is a play that encourages us to work together and [to consider] how important it is to be a team.  Great sports stories that inspire teamwork is what it's all about.  It's an invigorating piece of theater.

SB: How were you brought on board to direct "Bronx Bombers"?

SK: Well, I'm the resident Casting Director for Primary Stages and I've worked with Primary Stages for a very long time.  "Bronx Bombers" was a project that was brought to Primary Stages to develop and to work on; I had to interview for the job with the producers. I'd grown up as a Yankee fan -- [I'm] the daughter of a Yankees fan and my cousin used to direct the Yankee's game for Chanel 11 -- so in addition to loving the script they were developing at that point, I knew a lot about the history of the team.

SB: As you were reading the script, what were you searching for?

SK: I loved what they were coming up with. The whole concept is taking a look at a team: what is a team and how does the individual function as part of the whole? and how does that change over time?  It was so fascinating for me how Eric Simonson, who is also the director, chose specific Yankees to illustrate this point.  It was exciting to see these icons form on the page and to think about how I was going to bring actors to that party.

SB: What were your casting sessions like for "Bronx Bombers"?

SK: We gave the actors material ahead of time so they could read the script.  We included on our breakdowns that went to the agencies a picture of the actual baseball player, and we encouraged them to do research on the ballplayer before they came to us.  It's based on some measure of fact even though the circumstances that get all these players together are fictionalized.  We wanted our actors to know who the essence of these characters were.  It wasn't about doing an impersonation; it was to get the spirit of the people.

SB: When actors came into the audition, did any of them change what you were looking for?

SK: They're all amazing actors and all of them inhabited the roles so well.  CJ Wilson, who plays Babe Ruth, is a great example. When you first look at him you don't go, "Oh my goodness, there's Babe Ruth."  But what made me feel so strongly about Wilson is that he really has that larger than life spirit that Babe Ruth had. Wilson was like, "I don't know if this is the right role," and his agent and I said: "You got to trust us with this, you're the guy."  I feel that Simonson and our whole team initially was looking for someone who physically looked more like him, but Wilson really transformed the role and did great.

SB: Opening Night: from auditions to performance. What is that experience like?

SK: Oh my god, such a thrill.  At Primary Stages you really got the sense of these guys as a team, and to see them further the journey with Simonson working with them on the script, they made so many adjustments to tighten it more because it is a new play that evolved over time.  I think they really realized what the play is about.  They're a team, and whether you know the Yankees or not, you fall in love with what they are doing on stage.

(This interview has been edited and condensed.)