Anyone lucky enough to have watched Celia Cruz perform live can attest to her magical, infectious force. There was no way to take your eyes off a woman with an energy that was almost supernatural and a voice that thundered with Afro-Cuban soul.

And then there was the way she moved. Hips swaying, shoulders shaking, arms pumping. There was nothing sex-kittenish about the Queen of Salsa. Unlike most other female Latin singers, she didn't trade on suggestive super-femininity. Like the men who otherwise ruled the genre, Celia unapologetically packed a wallop.

There have been few women out there with the muscle to do a Celia hit justice. But now comes Anissa Gathers, who plays one of the Latin world's biggest stars in Celia: The Life and Music of Celia Cruz, running at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts through July 6.

Though short on professional experience, Gathers, whose mother is Dominican and father African-American and Puerto Rican, has been blowing away audiences with her spot-on portrayal of the singer who was silenced by brain cancer in 2003. She was the understudy when the musical opened Off Broadway in the fall of 2007. The better known Xiomara Laugart, who made a splash with the edgy Cuban-funk band Yerba Buena, played Celia until bowing out in March.

Her departure gave Gathers, who had performed in several Afro-Latin dance groups in New York and occasionally sung with salsa bands, her first big break.

''They weren't willing to trust this big role to somebody who didn't have the theater background,'' she says in Spanish while munching a salad at the Hilton on Biscayne Boulevard just a quick stroll from the Arsht Center. ``I was more of a dancer than a singer. I worked with several folkloric groups. But when I sang, it was three or four songs, and that's it. Never a whole show.''

Gathers says Celia's producers ``were worried that I just didn't have the experience to do eight shows a week. And it was hard at first. It took a while to develop the stamina to do a show where I have to sing 26 songs. When I took over in New York, by the end of the week, I was just exhausted. But now it's getting easier.''

POWERFUL VOICE

By most accounts, Laugart delivered a moving performance. But Gathers, physically thick like Celia and gifted with a similarly deep, powerful voice, nails the interpretation.

''I saw the show when it opened the other day, and there were moments when I thought I was watching Celia,'' says Omer Pardillo who was Cruz's manager. ``When she sings La Negra Tiene Tumbao, and the part where she copies Celia's performance in Africa with the Fania All-Stars, that's when she comes the closest. Her mannerisms, the way she walks on and off the stage -- it's obvious how much respect Anissa has for Celia. She really studied her. Celia's spiritual force filled the stage. And Anissa has that kind of presence, too.''

Gathers may not look exactly like Celia, but once she hits the stage in a copy of one of Cruz's extravagant gowns, sporting a tall wig and high heels (the show had a designer make a pair of Celia's signature cantilevered shoes) the magic is on.

There's that booming voice so close to la reina's that some folks are convinced Gathers is lip-synching in hits like Quimbara, Cúcala, Caramelo and Bemba Colorá. And there's the way Gathers strides across the stage, mike in fist. The way she punctuates lyrics with those exuberantly Cuban hand gestures. The way she pulls the audience into her party.

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