The Skylight’s holiday show

Remember those guy vocal groups from the 1950s and ’60s? The Lettermen, The Four Aces, The Three G’s, the Four Freshmen,the Ames Brothers and the like weren’t as outlandish as doo-wop but also weren’t as square as barbershop. They harmonized an easy-going sort of pop perfect for slow-dance rock ‘n’ roll.

Elvis Presley and the British Invasion killed them off. Which is the starting point of Forever Plaid. The conceit of that show, which had a long run at Marcus Center Vogel Hall in 2000, is that the four Plaids died on their way to what they hoped would be a breakthrough gig. It seems a bus full of high school girls on their way to see The Beatles wiped them out in a collision. Their ghosts get together to put on the longed-for TV variety special posthumously.

They’re baa-aack, courtesy of the Skylight Opera Theatre, with Plaid Tidings. Bill Theisen is directing the holiday spinoff, which runs through Jan. 3 at the Broadway Theatre Center.

Plaid Tidings will be Paul Helm’s seventh show at the Skylight. It will also be his second Plaid. He played Frankie in a summer stock production at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville. This time around, Helm is reincarnated as Jinx. Marty McNamee will play Frankie, Scott Stratton will play Smudge and Joe Fransee will play Sparky.

“They’re all distinct personalities,” Helm said Tuesday, between rehearsals. “Jinx is the shy guy. I get to come out of my shell with Besame Mucho, my big solo.”

Helm, 30, is a Greenfield native and UW-Milwaukee alum. He minored in theater there; his major was communications/public relations. He spent two years in PR, working in a cubicle at the Medical College of Wisconsin. After landing a role in the Hartland Festival in Platteville in 2004, Helm chucked PR and took a chance on a theater career. So far, it looks like a successful escape.

Helm’s versatility has helped him a lot. He is a more than competent pianist and is an actor, singer and dancer. At Platteville, he has done all of that and served as a stage director and music director. Helm will have a stint at the piano in Plaid Tidings, when the onstage pianist (James Valcq, also music director) takes a “union break.”

Plaid Tidings isn’t all Christmas music. At first, the guys have no idea why Rosemary Clooney, their heavenly fairy godmother of sorts, has sent them down to earth once again. They limber up with Strangers in Paradise, for example. Whatever Mambo Italiano might be, Helm and friends will sing it. And they will cover Clooney classic Come On-A My House.

She never appears on stage, but sends messages from a voice-over on high and via letters that drop from the heavens. By the end of Act 1, they realize they’ve been sent back to earth to do that TV Christmas Special they never lived to see in their first lives. The second half, with such songs as Cool Yule and Mr. Santa in addition to the usual fare, is that Plaid Christmas special.

“I’m very fond of this music, and the arrangements are intense,” Helm said. “It’s poignant at the end, but this is a charming, fun, happy show. It’s Christmas; we have enough heartache in our lives. Plaid Tidings will make you smile.”

Tickets are $20-$62 at the Skylight’s website, or call the box office, 414 291-7800.