And to think that Shawn Hatosy was thinking of getting his teeth bonded.

Hatosy, the Silver Spring-born star of "Outside Providence," which opens Sept. 1, was auditioning for the role of Timothy "Dunph" Dunphy two years ago when the movie's director, Michael Corrente, asked him to open wide.

"Michael was like, 'Show me your teeth,' " Hatosy recalled the other day during a telephone interview. "And I showed him, and he kind of had this look like, 'Eeeuww!' He was like, 'Yeah, they're pretty bad, but not for Dunphy. For Dunphy they'd be pretty good."

Let the record show that Hatosy's teeth aren't that bad. In fact, they're just snaggled enough to give the 23-year-old a baby face capable of innocence and just the slightest bit of mischief. It's a look that has helped lead to, if not a meteoric rise to stardom, at least a steady build to solid success.

And it wasn't Hatosy's teeth that gave him his first big break (an episode of "Homicide: Life on the Street" in 1995), or that got him a breakout role in the comedy "In & Out," or that made Kevin Costner write a role for him in the doomed apocalyptic epic "The Postman." Hatosy's effect on the filmmakers who have worked with him is much more ineffable than a couple of endearingly crooked ivories.

"People come here who are very good, or even great, but nothing ever came in here like Shawn Hatosy," says Pat Moran, the casting director who auditioned Hatosy for the "Homicide" appearance. Moran recalled that Hatosy, who played a prep school student accused of killing his grandparents, read for the role with veteran actors Ned Beatty, Richard Belzer and Henry Strozier.

"This little kid came in and sat in my chair, and I tell you, I was speechless," she says. "I didn't know what to say. Just to make sure I wasn't insane, I gave him some direction, I said, 'Pick this up, put this down,' and he did it with the subtlety and ease of a pro."

Moran notes that Hatosy, who was 19 at the time, "shouldn't have had any of that range at all. And acting is certainly about listening, which he did, instead of dropping the action and just waiting for his line. He could also change gears in a subtle manner. ... And the fact that he had red hair didn't hurt."

An early calling Hatosy grew up in Frederick, the son of a graphic designer and a loan officer. He says he knew from an early age that acting was in his future. "I just always enjoyed being the center of attention. If I was with a group of people on the bus or just around my parents, I always really enjoyed telling jokes or trying to get some sort of reaction."

He began appearing in local community theater and commercials when he was 10 ("Maryland Public Television and local Pizza Hut commercials, that sort of thing") but began pursuing the stage in earnest at the urging of Carl Freundel, the drama teacher at Linganore High School.

"He taught me so much, not even just about acting but music and poetry," Hatosy recalls. "He just had such a passion for it. It affected not just me but our whole school.

"We were doing all this innovative theater that we'd never seen before. Growing up doing community theater. It was 'Grease' and 'Oklahoma!' or 'Annie Get Your Gun.' Then we got there and we started doing these heavy, heavy dramatic pieces that just kind of turned me on to it, really. We were doing Sam Shepard plays and 'Macbeth' and that kind of thing."

Freundel, who is now a professor at Essex Community College, says that when he arrived at Linganore, he immediately began hearing "all these rumors that there was this really good actor who had done a lot of commercials. Then when I had him in class and saw how hard he worked and how disciplined he was, I got really excited. He was much more humble and dedicated to the craft than most of the actors I'd come across."

Freundel recalls that, whether Hatosy was starring in a version of "Wuthering Heights" or "Macbeth," "he understood emotions and qualities and nuances within the soul that no one his age should have a right to know."

Although Hatosy's application to Juilliard was denied, his appearance on "Homicide," as well as a tiny part in Jodie Foster's "Home for the Holidays," which was filmed in Maryland, convinced him that he could take a shot in New York. Moran called a friend who managed Melissa Leo and other young actors ("Never prior to or since have I called him about an actor," she says); Hatosy stayed with cousins who live in Queens and began to audition for roles.

Although his plan of landing a stage role didn't pan out, he did get roles in commercials and guest spots on a few TV movies and shows such as "Homicide" and "Law and Order." "Things just really started rolling," Hatosy recalls of his salad days. "Fortunately, I didn't go through a period where I was depressed and struggling. I had the family there, I had the people to help me out, and who knows, without that, what would have happened."

In 1996, Hatosy landed another role that would prove to be a significant turning point: in "In & Out," the coming-out comedy starring Kevin Kline, Hatosy played Kline's loyal student. ("Amazing," he says of Kevin Kline. "We'd do 20 takes or whatever, and he'd do it different every time, just cracking you up.")

Then, before "In & Out" was released, he got a small part in "The Postman." "I had met [Costner] one day, and 'In & Out' hadn't come out yet, so I was still trying to find work. It wasn't like people were saying, 'Oh, you're the boy in 'In & Out.' And he just kind of created this part for me, which was really nice."

After finishing "The Postman," Hatosy moved to Los Angeles -- just for a change, he says. That's when he read Peter and Bobby Farrelly's script for "Outside Providence," a coming-of-age comedy based on Peter Farrelly's novel of the same name.

Hatosy's character, Dunph, lives with his gruffly affectionate father (Alec Baldwin) and little brother in the blue-collar town of Pawtucket, R.I. When Dunph ingests some illicit herb and crashes the car, he's sent to a tony private school to finish his senior year. (Would it be giving too much away to add that the year transforms not only Dunph but his snooty classmates?)

The film's director, Michael Corrente, downplays the story about the teeth. "He just showed up, he had the right look, he had the right attitude, he had the talent and he had this way about him that really worked well for the character of Dunphy," Corrente recalls. "And when he smiled he didn't have piano-key teeth. There was something very natural and very honest about his appearance."

Corrente adds, "He's got a good sense of himself, he knows his craft, he's worked hard at it, and he's a joy to work with. Hopefully, he will avoid that trap of being so cool he gives himself a nosebleed."

Starring role Hatosy lobbied hard for "Outside Providence." "It was a fantastic script," he says. "It was the kind of thing where you're reading the pages, and I could identify with so many things that were going on. It's very rare to find a script that involves young people that you really come away with something. It really rings this bell that's honest and truthful."

After the episode with the teeth, Hatosy filmed the movie in Providence, R.I., and "Outside Providence" was ultimately picked up by Miramax Films. But Hatosy has had to wait for two years to see his first starring performance in theaters -- during which time he's made six more movies, including last year's "The Faculty" -- while Miramax finessed the timing.

"It just kept getting pushed -- for good reasons, though," says Hatosy, explaining that the filmmakers didn't want to release "Outside Providence" on the heels of the far grosser Farrelly comedy "There's Something About Mary." "Timing is such an important thing when it comes to opening a film."

Hatosy, whose coming films include "Simpatico," with Nick Nolte, Jeff Bridges and Sharon Stone, and "Anywhere But Here," with Susan Sarandon and Natalie Portman, is relieved that "Outside Providence" will finally be inside theaters.

About his career as a whole, he seems downright giddy.

"It's just surprising that this is what I do," he says. "Like, I've always really wanted it, and now it's kind of here, and I guess you ... just have to remember how fortunate you are and not forget that I'm doing what I want to do. I get to wake up every day and I'm happy and I love it, and it's not work."