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LIGHTNING PHOTOS: McDonald-Treadway sketch tops Theatre with the Stars

Sheriff Charlie McDonald and Scott Treadway play a scene from 'No Time for Sergeants.'

By Bill Moss, Published: April 12, 2015

Who knew?

That was the buzz at the first Theatre with the Stars competition when Sheriff Charlie McDonald delivered an impressive and in-character portrayal of the recruit Will Stockdale to sweep to victory and raise money for the STAR camps for youth. McDonald was joined by six other local "stars" who were paired with theater professionals to perform comic, dramatic and musical sketches. Audience members cheered, laughed and hooted and voted with their dollars for their favorite act

Paired with Scott Treadway, McDonald played the hillbilly Air Force recruit from "No Time for Sergeants," the 1958 comedy that launched the career of Andy Griffith. It's a role reversal. Griffith was an actor who played a small-town North Carolina sheriff. McDonald is a small-town North Carolina sheriff who took a night off to act.

Stockdale is undergoing an examination by a military psychiatrist to determine his fitness for a transfer. Wooden yet fidgety, ducking his head as the doctor fires bewildering questions about his childhood, his family and his view of women, Stockdale confounds the psychiatrist's attempt to get inside his head. In the end it's the shrink who goes off the deep end, throwing up his hands and granting the recruit the transfer he wants.

It's true that McDonald had the advantage of appearing with Treadway, the popular Playhouse veteran and a comic genius who knows how to wring the maximum laugh from every line and stage movement. But theatre professionals pointed out that McDonald's job was not as easy as it looked. "It's hard to play straight to Scott Treadway," one said.

Also starring were Ruth Birge and Steve Carlisle, in a scene from Carlisle's play "The Sandburgs of Connemara;" Ralph Redpath and Tiffany Ervin, as a Southern beauty contestant who knows that the  bigger the hair the closer one is to Jesus; Steve Katsadouros and Paige Posey in a "Gone with the Wind" sendup; Fair Nabers Waggoner and Preston Dyar, as Vera and Pearl in the funeral parlor scene from "Greater Tuna;" Bobby Wilkins, as himself more or less, offering guidance to an anxious new high school student, played by Lisa K. Bryant; and Bob Williford, with Angie Flynn-McIver, delivering a rap song about why the judges should choose him and his charity.

A huge cast of Pat's School of Dance dancers performed nine numbers.

Judges were Mayor Barbara Volk, Dr. Scott Donaldson, Community Foundation CEO McCray Benson and Park Ridge Health Communications Director Victoria Dunkle. The Theatre with the Stars band was made up of George Wilkins on piano, Charles Holland on bass and Paul Babelay on drums with guest singer Katie Cilluffo.

Although McDonald won the competition and a $1,000 check for the STAR camp, the Playhouse announced it was making donations to all the charities the stars had chosen. Those were the United Way of Henderson County, Four Seasons Rotary Club, Interfaith Assistance Ministry, Henderson County Young Leaders program and Hope Rx. A fundraiser as well for the Flat Rock Playhouse, the event was held at the Playhouse Downtown.