A magic carpet ride at Jacob's Pillow

A "sensored" floor responds when dancers or audience members move upon it. (Davide Venturini)

BECKET - In the 1988 movie "Big," Tom Hanks plays Josh, a 13-year-old boy temporarily trapped in a grown-up's body. The movie's iconic scene is set in F.A.O. Schwarz, where the big Josh entrances "real" adults as he plays "Heart and Soul" on a giant keyboard whose keys are activated by his skipping and hopping.

The sweet moral of the story, of course, is that we should strive to remain children at heart - remembering that a key component of childhood is playtime.

Well, it's game on this week at Jacob's Pillow, where the Italian dance-theatre company Teatro di Piazza o d'Occasione is hosting a gently unusual play date. Like the movie's giant keyboard, T.P.O. has created what it calls a sensored carpet that responds visually and sonically when moved upon - with the help of some sophisticated technology, natch. The Doris Duke Studio Theatre has been rearranged in-the-round style so that audiences can easily see this almost living stage as its surface undergoes a constant stream of metamorphoses.

Directors Francesco Gandi and Davide Venturini have developed a series of interactive performances structured loosely enough for ample audience participation. At the Pillow they are presenting two shows from the "Garden" series; I saw "The Painted Garden." The atmosphere, though lovely, is not exceptionally challenging; it's very well suited to children, who will probably get the biggest kick out of the experience.

"The Painted Garden" was created with the Kurdish painter Rebwar Saeed, who uses the colors yellow, blue, green, and red to represent earth, water/sky, life, and love. Dancers Carolina Amoretti and Stefania Rossetti act as elegant hostesses, leading audience members by the hand to the stage, whispering simple instructions to them. Their own movements are confined to rolling and tumbling and spinning, with an occasional shoulder stand thrown in.

At the beginning of each of the four sections, the stage is spread with the image of a large carpet. As the dancers, and then the selected audience members, move across the surface, images pop up or melt away like a magical light show, all very dreamlike. A trippy game of Twister is played as the dancers step on one rectangle of color, then curve and bend to reach another, then another. Except here the rectangles, when touched, disperse like evaporating puddles, only to pool up again when the dancer has moved on. Big swirls scatter into smaller, spidery patterns. Phantom fish suddenly swim through, inviting a chase.

Participants responded in all sorts of ways: shy, sheepish, curious, bold. Two children went up several times. The boy's delight was overt, a smile playing on his face while he skittered about. The girl, more circumspect, eventually took on more independence, calmly exploring the stage.

Adults, too, were mostly game. Afterward, I asked two of them how their magic carpet ride was. "Awesome!" they simultaneously chimed. It seems that we all need a little play in our lives. And then, of course, a nap.