WHAT ARE YOU DOING NEW YEAR’S EVE?

First Night was started in Boston in 1976 by a group of artists seeking an alternative to your typical New Year’s Eve debauchery. What began as a few events on Boston Common has expanded to encompass the entire city, with more than 40 venues and some 250 performances city-wide. First Night is now Boston’s primary celebration, attracting more a million button-wearing revelers; we’ll cover its events in next week’s "Arts News."

This week, however, we look at the many First Night alternatives in Boston. Nothing says New Year’s like the metropolis mashing of Kaiju Big Battel. The Cyclorama at the Boston Center for the Arts, 539 Tremont Street in the South End, hosts First Fight Out — good versus evil in the form of monster wrestling. You’ve got the meathead macho of the WWF and the wackiness of Japanimation. Toss in Akrobatik and DJ Sense, not to mention an open bar from 10 to 11 p.m., and this event is as epic as it gets, New Year’s or not. Tickets are $25; call (800) 477-6849.

Porn star Ron Jeremy has some epic dimensions, and he’s hosting an ecstatic, orgasmic New Year’s dance extravaganza on Lansdowne Street. For $50, you can "party like a pornstar" at any or all of the Avaland quintuplet: Avalon, Axis, Embassy, ID, and Modern. And if Jeremy isn’t big enough to satisfy your New Year’s yearnings, DJs Micro, Dave Ralph, Nailz, Tasty, Taner K, Eddie Lee, and Ricky Fatts will provide beats that’ll touch you in all the right places. Call (617) 536-2100.

If on the other hand techno doesn’t whip your New Year’s Eve cream, consider that you have plenty of choices when it comes to live bands. Downstairs at the Middle East, 480 Massachusetts Avenue in Central Square, the Upper Crust perform in full aristocratic regalia: beauty marks, powdered wigs, satin knickers. Don’t let their patrician attire turn you off from their seriously good "roque and roll." The Shods share the bill with their punk approach and pop sensibilities, and the Prime Movers play their 20th anniversary show. Cover is $25. Upstairs, Holly GoLightly bring their modern folk rock from Canada, opening for the guitar-driven motor punk of Rock City Crimewave. Cover here is $20. And the adjoining Zuzu boasts the surf spy instrumentals of the Ray Corvair Trio. Cover is here is just $10. Call (617) 864-EAST.

At nearby T.T. the Bear’s, 10 Brookline Street, indie-popsters the Gentlemen ring in 2003 with the Brett Rosenberg Problem’s pop punk and the honky-tonk punk of Jake Brennan and the Confidence Men. Tickets are $15; call (617) 492-BEAR. Boston funk band Superhoney play Johnny D’s, in Somerville’s Davis Square. Tickets are $35; call (617) 776-2004. The 10,000 Maniac–esque Mudhens play Harpers Ferry, 158 Brighton Avenue in Allston. Tickets are $35; call (617) 254-9743. The Gladstones play the Kendall Café, 253 Cardinal Medeiros Way in Cambridge, for the third New Year’s in a row; they’re joined by the rootsy pop of the Splendid Nobodies and the breezy country rock of Lemonpeeler. Cover is $5; call (617) 661-0993. Entrain and DJ Krutch play the House of Blues, 96 Winthrop Street in Harvard Square. Cover is $75; call (617) 491-BLUE. Rockabilly and honky-tonk rule the night at the Milky Way, 405 Centre Street in Jamaica Plain, with the Crank-Tones, Lenny and His Piss Poor Boys, and the Heygoods. Cover is $15; call (617) 524-3740. Finger food and heavy metal go hand in hand at the Abbey Lounge, 3 Beacon Street in Somerville, with Red Chord, Muck and the Mires, the Allen Divine Band, and complimentary hors d’œuvre. Cover is $15; call (617) 441-9631.

Power chords are a mainstay on any New Year’s menu. But there are also jazz recipes to choose from. Downstairs at Ryles, 212 Hampshire Street in Inman Square, Herman Johnson plays two sets; tickets are $79.95 per couple. Or go upstairs and light a fire under your feet for feisty salsa and merengue dancing. Tickets there are $25; call (617) 876-9330. John Pizzarelli — jazz guitarist, vocalist, and a premier interpreter of the Great American Songbook — leads his trio at Scullers, in the DoubleTrees Guest Suites Hotel. Tickets are $50; call (617) 562-4111. And at Green Street Grill, 280 Green Street in Central Square, prodigal Cuban pianist Tony Perez joins Kilombo Mambo and Yasek Manzano on trumpet to keep the mambo tradition alive and contemporary. Tickets are $15; call (617) 876-1655.

Battles, beats, and bands aside, there’s still a slew of ways to welcome the new year. Laughter is always a good way to end one year and begin another, so consider the mainstage show at Improv Asylum, 216 Hanover Street in the North End. And the comedy’s not all; there’s dancing afterward. Tickets are $40; call (617) 263-1221. Over at the Comedy Connection, in Faneuil Hall, Steve Sweeney, a king among Boston comics, does his stand-up thing alongside wild man Kevin Knox and Lauren Verge. Tickets are $49 to $60; call (617) 248-9700.

Those who prefer billiards to belly laughs can watch the (eight) ball drop at Boston Billiard Club, 126 Brookline Avenue, where there’ll be party favors, pool, dancing, and more. A table for four is $125; call (617) 536-POOL. And the Rack, 24 Clinton Street in Faneuil Hall, asks, "Why spend an intimate New Year’s with loved ones when you can hob-nob with strangers and celebrities at a party-plex?" Exactly! Tickets are $50; call (617) 725-1051.

Moving up the cultural ladder (not that billiards are by any means the bottom rung), you’ll find plenty of theaters out there ready and willing to take your cash. Some even add more shows. So if you’d like to spend New Year’s Eve with dancing cutlery, cobalt mutes, or the man who failed to be as cranky as Andy Rooney, you’re on.

Beauty and the Beast, the Broadway-hit musical that replicates the 1991 Disney animation, continues at the Colonial Theatre, 106 Boylston Street in the Theater District. Tickets are $23 to $70; call (671) 931-2000. For those who yearn to spend First Night with Rhoda Morgenstern but consider Nick at Nite a losers’ New Year’s Eve, Valerie Harper is at the Wilbur Theatre, 246 Tremont Street in the Theater District, in The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife, Charles Busch’s Tony-nominated comedy about a Manhattan matron roused from midlife depression by a globetrotting friend who may or many not be a fraud. Tickets are $23 to $65; call (617) 931-2000.

At the Charles Playhouse, 74 Warrenton Street in the Theater District, both Blue Man Group and Shear Madness have added shows. Upstairs, the Blue boys drum through paint, garland the audience with toilet paper, and generally make fun of the art world at 7 and 10 p.m. Tickets are $59 to $69; call (617) 931-2787. Downstairs, the anarchic, audience-interactive, ridiculously long-running mystery set in a Newbury Street hair salon is on at 5 and 8 p.m. Tickets are $36; call (617) 426-5225. And over at the Stuart Street Playhouse, 200 Stuart Street, Back from Broadway, in which key-tickling Gershwin interpreter Hershey Felder and full-tonsiled Broadway leading man James Barbour offer musical standards and show-biz reminiscences, is on at 7 and 10 p.m. Tickets are $29.50; call (800) 447-7400.

Across the river in Davis Square, Cambridge-bred satirist Jimmy Tingle has taken over the former Elm Street Theatre and renamed it Jimmy Tingle’s Off Broadway, and the new impresario is breaking in his new space with his own new show. Entitled Jimmy Tingle in the Promised Land and marketed as "a fresh, hilarious, and insightful 90 minutes of commentary and probing observations," it’s on at 7 and 10 p.m., providing a healthy alternative to Republican bubbly. That’s at 255 Elm Street, and tickets are $25; call (617) 591-1616.

Also on the north side of the river, at Harvard’s Sanders Theatre, Boston Baroque’s Gala New Year’s Eve concert offers works by Bach, Handel, Purcell, and Telemann. Tickets are $26 to $62; call (617) 484-9200. Back on the south side, the Boston Pops performs its final "Holiday Pops" of the season. Bruce Hangen is on the podium; the performance is followed by post-concert dancing, and then dessert and refreshments. Symphony Hall is at 301 Massachusetts Avenue, and tickets are $75 to $158; call (617) 266-1200.

Then there’s New Year’s Day, when, according to U2, all is quiet — probably because everyone’s too hungover to speak. One way to start the new year is in the tranquillity of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. If Red Chord gave you a headache at the Abbey Lounge (that or the six glasses of champagne), lingering over works by Botticelli and Titian might be just the remedy you need. Honoring the start of its centennial year, the Gardner, at 280 the Fenway, invites the public to its first annual "Frank Hatch First Day Free." Admission is indeed free; call (617) 566-1401.

And nothing soothes an aching head or refreshes body and soul like a dip in Boston Harbor. Join the L Street Brownies, many octogenarians among them, for their annual New Year’s Day dip at Carson Beach. That too is free; call (617) 727-6034.

EXONERATED?

Boston is to be one of three cities on a limited tour of The Exonerated, which was positively received Off Broadway this fall. Tony winner (for Death of a Salesman) Brian Dennehy will appear with Marlo Thomas in the Boston engagement of Jessica Blank & Erik Jensen’s docudrama, which was culled from 40 interviews conducted with former death-row inmates who’d been wrongly convicted. The New York concert staging, which the Times pronounced "deeply affecting," featured Jill Clayburgh and Richard Dreyfuss, among others, and was directed, as the touring production is, by Bob Balaban. The Boston engagement is at the Wilbur Theatre January 21 through February 2. Tickets go on sale today, December 20, at the Wilbur box office, 246 Tremont Street in the Theater District, or around the corner at the Colonial Theatre box office, 106 Boylston Street, or through Ticketmaster at (617) 931-2787.