Kathleen Arcovio's college graduation road trip has included rambunctious crowds, harem garb and unusual bedtimes.

But for this 2004 Fox Chapel Area High School graduate, those crowds have been mostly 10 years old and under, and her outfit is the costume she wears while playing the role of Fatima in the Windy City Players' traveling children's production of "Aladdin."

Those bedtimes? Because she and her fellow actors may perform up to four times a day at different schools, Ms. Arcovio said she often goes to sleep exhausted around 9 p.m.

"It's the most wonderful, tiring job I've ever had," she said. "I get to play with kids all day, and who wouldn't want to do that?"

Ms. Arcovio auditioned for the Windy City Players' director, Matthew English, after graduating in the spring from Northwestern University and was chosen to be in one of the organization's touring groups, which perform interactive plays for preschool and grade school children.

Ms. Arcovio's group left Chicago in September and will criss-cross the midwest and eastern United States before ending in New York by Thanksgiving.

Although most children are familiar with the Aladdin story through the popular 1992 Disney film, Ms. Arcovio pointed out that the play her three-person company performs has more in common with the original tale from "1,001 Arabian Nights."

"I play the Princess, and Aladdin's best friend, Fatima, who is poor like him," she said. "It's a love story, an adventure story and it's very, very silly."

Trevor Kuhn from Las Vegas plays Aladdin and an old man, and Ellen Wert, from Greensboro, N.C., plays the genie and the trickster.

Costumes and sets fold up into duffel bags, and the whole company travels in one SUV.

Ms. Arcovio, whose theater degree focused on drama education, said her favorite part of performing in schools is the reception of her audience.

"The show is interactive, so the kids help the action along," she said, noting that several children get to take the stage and speak lines. "They are the fourth character."

She added that it was especially rewarding to see the reaction of children with little exposure to theater.

"Some of these kids have never seen a play before, so it's a completely new experience to them," she said. "They think it's all real, that there's real magic and that we're really our characters."

She also delights, she said, in the unusual questions children ask after the show. "They want to know how to act, and how we change clothes so fast. But then one kid asked, 'What's your favorite muffin?' "

Ms. Arcovio said she's performed for all ages, to audiences as small as 14 and as large as 580. Highlights so far have been Indianapolis, Peoria and Terre Haute, Ind. "And Morton, Ill.," she added. "It's the pumpkin capital of the world."

But the Indiana Township native is glad to be home for a run of local performances, which have included stops at Winchester Thurston, Christ the Divine Teacher in Latrobe, St. Margaret of Scotland in Green Tree, and St. Rosalia Academy and Port Allen Elementary in Greenfield.

After tomorrow, Ms. Arcovio will be off to Philadelphia and Boston, and her long-term plans may include graduate school and teaching drama education.

But for now, she's happy to dress up as Fatima and entertain children from all over.

"This job has been just fantastic, a dream job for someone right out of college," she said. "And I have faith that I'm going to be doing a lot of children's theater in the future."