Exclusive | 100-year-old NYC cabaret singer shares her secret to longevity: ‘Everything about her is an inspiration’

She’s still kicking after all these years.

Longtime New York cabaret singer Lynne Charnay marked her 100th birthday Tuesday night by paying homage to her decades-long history in New York theater  – which has taken her from Manhattan piano bars to the small screen to Broadway’s Palace Theatre.

The newly-minted centenarian, who celebrated the milestone crooning to a sold-out crowd at a piano bar in Manhattan, says her performances help to keep her young at heart.

“It’s very satisfying to be able to move people,” Charnay told The Post in an interview at her Upper West Side apartment last week. “I’m very grateful.”

The songstress said that, while becoming one of New York’s more than 5,700 centenarians has been a goal for her, how she was able to do so isn’t entirely explained by her family gene pool.

“People say to me, you must have wonderful genes – but I have terrible genes,” she said.

“My mother had breast cancer,” Charnay said. “She had a bad heart. My father was diabetic, and had a stroke at the end of his life. Those are my genes. I think it’s my interest in people that keeps me alive.”

The actress credits her twice-weekly yoga and Pilates routine for her impressive physical health — and for her mental health, bimonthly musical “salons” she hosts in her living room with a handful of friends.

“I don’t have much family, [and] a lot of my friends are dead – but I make friends easily because I love people, and they can feel that I’m interested in them,” she said.

The Upper West Side native recalled myriad encounters on buses, airplanes and on the street where she started conversation with a stranger and left with a new chum.

“Somebody asks me for directions on Central Park West and, before we’re through, I’ve invited them to my home.”

Charnay, born Ella Chernoff to Russian immigrants on the Upper West Side, began her love of music on the lap of her mother – a doctor who learned to play the piano by ear.

As a child, she played the lead roles in school performances before adopting an Americanized version of her name: “Ella” became “Lynne” and “Chernoff” became “Charnay,” inspired by the name of a boutique on 57th Street.

The subsequent eight-decade career in show biz included Broadway features in “Tonight in Samarkand,” and “The Grand Tour” as well as other roles in “Nude With Violin” and “Chez Garbo.”

Her time in “The Grand Tour” at the Palace Theatre is forever memorialized on bench she purchased at her family plot in Mount Lebanon Cemetery in Queens, she said. As a nod to her vaudeville predecessors who longed for a spot on the storied stage, the inscription reads: “she played The Palace.”

On the small screen, she’s lent her talents to the likes of Law & Order, as well as various made-for-TV movies.

However, it’s the dimly-lit cabaret scene where Charnay gained her moniker “the devastating Lynne Charnay” from a The New York Times review — which she hangs proudly in her home.

“What I love about doing cabaret is that I have in my hands,” Charnay said. “The ability to make the audience want to cry, and in the next minute I want to laugh — I love that.”

Tuesday night’s cabaret performance at Hell’s Kitchen’s Don’t Tell Mama included nearly two dozen musical renditions — from “Another Candle on the Cake” to “A Hundred Years from Today” and tunes in Russian and French — with Charnay’s longtime musical director Rolf Barnes accompanying the chanteuse at the piano.

The birthday show doubled as a family affair, featuring duets with granddaughter Rafaella Fiore-Mark and son Tony Mark, as well as longtime friends and industry collaborators.

Her encore, from her last feature on Broadway in “The Grand Tour” in 1979, declared: “I’ll be here tomorrow alive and well and thriving/I’ll be here tomorrow, my talent is surviving,” which was met with a standing ovation.

“She’s a marvel,” said show attendee Beth Anne Crane, who first met Charnay nine years ago at her Dionysus-themed restaurant in Charleston, South Carolina.

“Everything about her is an inspiration. She would sit at the restaurant and people would meet her, and they’d just want to sit down and talk to her because she has these amazing stories.”

“She’s just her authentic self,” said 23-year-old Manhattan resident Lily Kaltinick. “Whether she’s being serious, charming or cracking jokes she is just always herself and always a good time.”

“Most 100-year-olds probably can’t get up out of bed for 20 minutes,” added Aramis Pettinato, 25, of Staten Island, “and she’s doing a show for an hour and a half, singing and hitting beautiful notes. I loved it.”

The Tuesday celebration will continue with a second show on Wednesday night due to popular demand — a milestone first for the performer.

“Maybe they think this is it – they’ll never have a chance at it [again],” Charnay said. “It’s my guess, since I’m turning 100 years old.”

“No,” she quickly corrected, “100 years young.”