Tongues wag as city hypes LOVE & kisses

Samantha LeVinson, 20, of Brooklyn, N.Y., was visiting friends in Philly yesterday when she was invited to LOVE Park to help out with a film being shot. When she got there, she was asked to kiss a stranger.

"We just really hit it off," LeVinson said of her encounter with Alex McCarron, 24, of Philadelphia.

They were among dozens of couples (or potential couples) who showed up throughout the day near Robert Indiana's LOVE sculpture to pucker up for the cameras of the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp.

The agency is hosting a 10-week campaign promoting this month's 100,000th booking of its Philly overnight hotel package, which was introduced in 2001.

"I wanna kiss you so badly right now," the crowd collectively yelled, on cue.

The couples were expected to engage in "40 seconds of uninterrupted makeout time," said filmmaker Ted Passon, who was contracted by the city's tourism department to take on the project.

The tension was high. Mints and mouthwash were circulated in the crowd, when Passon directed over the megaphone: "Everybody turn to your partner and look them right in the eye, and whether or not you believe this, say, 'There's nowhere else I'd rather be right now.' "

The sweet-talking and background music set the mood until the director called: "Action."

The casting call, via massive e-mails, Facebook invites and media coverage, resulted in a good turnout on the balmy day.

Kissers wore hardhats and police uniforms, lab coats and kimonos, pin-striped business suits and neon-hued jumpsuits.

"We're making history today - this is the hope that Obama's been talking about," Passon, 27, told the crowd.

"We always talk about changing the world for the better, especially lately," Passon said. "[But] what does that world look like?"

Passon said that he was inspired by a vision of the kind of world he would want to live in. "This is my utopian love-letter to Philadelphia," he told the Daily News.

The rehearsals went on for hours before the first shot was filmed. Amused onlookers gathered as filming proceeded.

"I feel like I'm on a different planet," said Jamal Smith, 19, of Philadelphia, one of many skateboarders darting around the film equipment.

Kurt Hunte, 29, a member of a local rap group, Plastic Little, and a friend of Passon's, was asked to partake at the last minute with a platonic friend. "It was a lot of making out," Hunte laughed afterward. "We never took our relationship past making lunch for each other."

Once everyone adjusted to the public displays of affection, it was business as usual despite the potential awkwardness. "Part of my job today was to watch my parents make out," joked Passon, whose parents were part of the passion posse.

The video will be posted on www.gophila.com, along with other lovey-dovey events, in time for Valentine's Day.