Eat, [redacted] and be merry: Prohibition the focus of dinner and music show

The dinner and music show Run for the Hills, set in the prohibition era,promises a foot-stomping, hand-clapping evening of Maritime music propelled by the fiddle and lubricatedwith overflowingmugfulsof, er, cold tea.

Wink, wink.

"If you want anything to drink, if you want a spirit, you have to ask for cold tea," explains Shane Pendergast, one of the four performers putting on the show twice a week at Clinton Hills rustic barn venue in Clinton, P.E.I. "That's the code word."

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The show is the brainchild of Shane's father, well-known Island musician Michael Pendergast.

"He kind of came up with the show and the route that we took, going with prohibition and rum-running," Shane Pendergast told CBC Radio's Mainstreet P.E.I.

Audience caught up in the illicit liquor

The Pendergastsare putting onthe two-hour show on Sundays and Tuesdays throughout the summer, along with performers Olivia Roberts and SkyeMacAusland.

Roberts said that, aside from enjoying the music andthe food, the audience will learn a thing or two about rum-running.

"We were the last province in Canada to [continue]with prohibition, so everybody else in Canada kind of stopped prohibition in the 20s and then we didn't stop until the 40s," she said.

Said Pendergast: "Our joke is that on the Island we like to take our time and we don't rush in: we wait for Confederation and we wait for prohibition."

The show includes a variety of East Coast music, with most of the songs written by the Pendergasts.

Asked if he always wanted to play music growing up, Pendergast said:"I don't even know if I had a choice. But I always loved it. You grow up around it and it's really special, playing with your dad. Not a lot of people get to do that."

The show includes lots of crowd interaction, including getting "pulled into the story a little bit with the rum-running," Pendergast said. "In the show we're expecting a shipment of rum so we kind of get everybody involved in that story."

People interested in the show are asked to book online at clintonhills.ca

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