Peninsula Spotlight
Peninsula Daily News
3
Friday, November 4, 2011
Four Plaids to ring in holiday season By Diane Urbani de la Paz
Peninsula Spotlight
DUNGENESS — The Four Plaids — dapper guys who sing as one — have returned. With red cardigans and plaid neckties, and then changing to bow ties and plaid cummerbunds, they’re all ready for a holiday show inside the historic Dungeness Schoolhouse, this and next weekend. Oh, hold on now. The guys have good reasons to go so soon into that Christmas mode. First, the Four Plaids are seizing their very last chance. They were in a bus accident, according to “Forever Plaid,” the first production featuring the singers. They were killed instantly.
Last opportunity But they have been given one final opportunity to come back down to Earth, and sing their favorites: sweet pop songs from the 1950s, alongside heartwarmers such as “The Christmas Song,” “Silent Night” and “O Little Town of Bethlehem.”
Diane Urbani
de la
Paz/Peninsula Spotlight
The Four Plaids — Bud Davies, left, Ric Munhall, Shawn Dawson and Brian Doig — croon some swoon-worthy tunes this weekend and next at the Dungeness Schoolhouse. Fortunately for those who love the ’50s and the Plaids, they’re doing not one, but six concerts. This new show is “Plaid Tidings,” and it will fill the Dungeness Schoolhouse with four-part harmonies tonight, Saturday and Sunday, and then return next Friday, Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 11-13. The Four Plaids are here on the Peninsula, of all
places, because they are the stars of Readers Theatre Plus’ annual scholarship fundraiser. They are singing six times in order to generate support for local students, particularly those who plan to pursue higher education in the arts. “We’re going to get in and get out. We invite you to start your holiday season in the ’50s,” said Readers Theatre Plus co-founder
Carol Swarbrick Dries. “Tidings,” she added, is a fully staged, fully choreographed musical production, unlike the simple staged readings the troupe typically does. Dewey Ehling, conductor of the Peninsula Singers, the Port Townsend Community Orchestra, Port Angeles’ “Nutcracker” orchestra and the singalong Handel’s “Messiah” each year in
Sequim, is the director. And Gary McRoberts “is the orchestra,” Swarbrick Dries added, even if he has but one instrument: the piano. “The way he plays, it’s an orchestra,” she said. The Four Plaids are Shawn Dawson, Bud Davies, Brian Doig and Ric Munhall — silken voices all, Swarbrick Dries added. “This is the old harmonizing that can’t be beat,” replete with an Ed Sullivan Show-style segment, a mambo and songs like “Moments to Remember.” Doig, who plays a Plaid named Jinx, has been relishing rehearsals. “What’s really great about this,” he said, “is that everybody works as a group, but we all do individual things. So it’s fun to sit out and watch the other guys have their moments.” Dawson, who plays Sparky, came back to the Plaids in large part because Ehling is directing. “I’ll pretty much do any show he’s doing,” Dawson said. “The level of performance he requires is really high.” There are also poignant turns, such as the childhood Christmas story Davies tells. “It is absolutely lovely,”
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Swarbrick Dries said. But fear not; all isn’t serious in “Plaid Tidings.” Dawson’s favorite moments come when the foursome does its threeminute, 11-second Ed Sullivan appearance, and with “Sh-boom,” a song the crooners do with long-handled toilet plungers. “They fly through the air, and hopefully we catch them,” the singer said. “Christmas aside, it’s just a really fun show,” Dawson added. “It’s about coming out and having a nice, fun evening, and it’s a fundraiser for scholarships.” Curtain time for “Plaid Tidings” is 7:30 tonight and Saturday night and 2 p.m. Sunday; those times hold true next weekend, too. Tickets are $15 per person or two for $25, available in advance at Odyssey Books, 114 W. Front St. in Port Angeles, and Pacific Mist Books, 121 W. Washington St. in Sequim. Remaining tickets will be sold at the door, but “if you wait, you’re taking a big risk,” Swarbrick Dries said. “Forever Plaid” was a big hit, and she has a feeling that four years hence, people still like a song — or several — in their hearts.
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