For Jeremy Piven, “The Performance,” available on streaming platforms, is a passion project with familial and historical purpose.

At 59, Piven remains best known as volcanically explosive Hollywood super agent Ari Gold on “Entourage” and the ambitious Yank who taught the Brits what makes a mighty department store in the PBS biographical “Mr. Selfridge” series.

“Performance” casts him as Harold May, an American tap dancer touring 1930s Europe with a dance troupe. Their fortunes soar when they’re booked to play Berlin which for Harold, a closeted Jew, is incredibly precarious when they discover Nazi fuhrer Adolf Hitler is their audience.

This film, Piven said in a post-screening discussion, “started 15 years ago! When we started, I could do this move where while tap dancing, I jumped up and touched my toes. Now I can’t touch my toes. That’s what happens.”

Each of the tap troupe’s musical numbers tell what’s going on dramatically.

“Tap is a narrative form that tells stories. This style of tap is specific to the ’30s but it’s also an art form. You can sense the heartbeat of the performer doing it.

“We are really right there with Harold as things are getting darker and he’s getting more insight into exactly how dangerous the situation is.”

Of course, Piven is only playing a tap dancer, he isn’t one.

“One of the superpowers of an actor is being delusional,” he joked.  “I didn’t think, ‘Oh, I don’t tap dance.’ I just thought, ‘Okay, this is brilliant. I will learn how to tap dance and play this role.’

“Then you begin tapping, and you’re humiliated daily. But, I do play the drums — and that’s what saved me. Because I know rhythmically where we’re going.”

There were tense times along the way.

“The movie asks: What are we willing to compromise? Harold’s willing to do anything.

“It’s funny,” Piven said, “my life was mirroring the role. Because this is an indie film, the night before filming began, I had to fly to London. Literally tap dance and perform to get some money for the film!

“I know myself and I was like, ‘Oh no, I’m going to get sick’ — because it’s just so much pressure: Jumping on a plane, coming back! And on our first day of filming.

“I was sick, I had the flu. And suddenly it was just so empowering. I was like, It doesn’t matter what is thrown at me. It’s that feeling of nothing can stop us. You have to make your own breaks in this life and I created this. And I was lucky to do it, and so honored. I really was living Harold throughout this.”