Forever Plaid - Las Vegas

SHOW OFF IN JANUARY 2007 - may return in February- skip 2007.01.02 ***Age requirements-age 4 and older***Perhaps it was inevitable that art mirrors life with the resurrection of "Forever Plaid" in Las Vegas, a place where harmony groups never say die. The big question about the popular show's revival after a four-year break: Would a cast that opened the musical here in 1995 now seem a bit long in the tooth to play nervous college-age nerds? Sort of like Sean Connery returning as James Bond after 12 years (in "Never Say Never Again"), only at the opposite end of the cool spectrum. Not to fret. The four stars of "Plaid" are still younger than most of the audience at the Gold Coast. And their "aging in the afterlife," as performer J. Gregory Davis proposed, has a visual logic in a city where 64-year-old Tony Butala still sings with The Lettermen. The real test is the vocal standard. Those who remember the musical from the Flamingo can be assured the "Plaid" cast still delivers the impressive blend of pristine harmonies and nuanced comedy required to make Stuart Ross' comic revue take flight. Davis, Bruce Ewing and Doug Frank all found other work in town after the Flamingo edition closed in early 2001. They're now reunited and joined by Dale Sandish as Sparkie, who wields the showiest voice and a good share of the lead vocals. The staging and lighting have been spruced up in the Gold Coast's 400-seat showroom, making it a great cabaret for a show that best works its charms in a small setting, with only piano and bass to underscore the vocals. Audiences need to be pulled close to share the personality quirks of the Four Plaids, likeable underachievers out to stage "the biggest comeback since Lazarus" after a cosmic convergence lets them do the show they never made it to in 1964. It seems they were out to strike a blow for harmony when their car was smashed by a busload of Catholic schoolgirls bound to see the Beatles. Briefly reunited in the material world, the four check their zippers and chuck their orthodontic retainers. They lurch through their clunky choreography on "Gotta Be This or That" and discover "We never sounded this good in life." For first-time audiences, the bigger surprise is that one doesn't have to go into "Plaid" as a fan of the vocal sound popularized by the Four Freshmen or Four Aces. For one thing, there's a not-so-reverent approach to some of the golden oldies: "Sixteen Tons" is scored with ketchup bottle-and-spoon percussion, topped out with licks on a recorder. And that tribute to Perry Como, like much of the musical, can be taken at face value or as slightly mocking satire. It's Ross' skill as a writer that he never tips his hand too far in either direction. And unlike some catalog tributes such as "Ain't Misbehavin', " there's an arc to this one, and character development. It's fun to watch the growing confidence of Jinx, the nose-bleeder (Ewing), or Smudge (Frank), who "was never good at patter" but nonetheless possesses a knock-kneed grandiloquence. By the end of it, the four have roundhoused you into revisiting the show's jokey premise and actually feeling bittersweet for Davis' speech about the need to let go of the fleeting triumph. Not bad for a show that first makes you wonder where it can possibly go after the third song. But "Plaid" is more technically elaborate than it wants you to notice, and doles out its surprises gradually. "Matilda" becomes a production piece that carries into the audience, while the show-stopping tribute to Ed Sullivan manages to work in visual homages to Liberace, singing nuns, Topo Gigio and Alvin & the Chipmunks. When it debuted, "Plaid" was way ahead of the Strip's current interest in theater, and the effort to make a complicated show look easy is still a bit out of phase with productions centered on stagecraft. That just makes us appreciate "Plaid" all the more, enjoying its second lease on life as much a