TWO REAL-LIFE couples are playing the romantic duos in White Christmas.

It’s no coincidence.

"We were all sitting around having a few drinks at our house when Stephen and I thought this makes sense. We seem to be right for these parts, the four of us," says actor-singer Robin Hutton, who lives in Stratford with her husband Stephen Patterson .

"We got on the phone and called our agent," says dancer-actor Dayna Tekatch. She also lives in Stratford with her partner of three years, Laird Mackintosh.

The two couples share the same agent, Bruce Dean, who is a good friend of White Christmas’s director Marcia Kash. "He pitched us to them," says Robin. "We auditioned in Toronto, Stephen and I did, and we worked really hard in the hopes of getting it."

Kash says she was familiar with the work of all four actors. "I saw Laird and Dayna at Stratford in My One and Only, which is a big tap show and they were so great. We knew they’d be right for the show.

"Stephen I’d seen in Urinetown. He and Robin came and auditioned for us and they were so perfect. It just seemed an ideal way to go."

It’s a dream come true for both couples.

"To be away as we all are from our family at Christmas," says Dayna. "When you have to be away it’s a gift to be around people that are your second family."

"You’re invited to come with us to my first cousin’s home, she lives out in Fall River. They’re expecting you if you want to come," says Robin, who hails from a large family in St. John’s, Nfld.

The four actors also love the musical, an American adaptation of the movie which is getting its Canadian premiere at Neptune Theatre just one hour before it opens in Toronto. .

"It’s a sweet show," says Stephen, who grew up in Moose Jaw, "a classic story that’s been on TV for years. I remember growing up watching it as a kid."

White Christmas, the top money-making movie of 1954, starred Danny Kaye and Bing Crosby as ex-army pals Phil Davis (Kaye) and Bob Wallace who teamed up to become a top song-and-dance act. Phil introduces Bob to a pair of beautiful sisters who also have a song and dance act, Betty (Rosemary Clooney) and Judy (dance sensation Vera-Ellen).

When Betty and Judy travel to a Vermont ski resort to perform a Christmas show, Wallace and Davis follow, only to find their former commander, General Waverly, is the lodge owner. A series of romantic mix-ups ensue as the performers try to help the General who has no guests because there’s no snow.

"To get to play sisters with Robin, it’s so dreamy," says Dayna, who has the Vera-Ellen role.

"I’m Danny Kaye," says Laird.

Stephen plays the Bing Crosby character and gets to launch the classic song White Christmas. Robin has the Rosemary Clooney role.

The play is different from the movie, says Stephen. "In the stage version they had an opportunity to tighten it a little. It pays respect to the film version but it’s a little slicker, faster paced.

"There are more Irving Berlin songs," says Dayna. The stage play’s producers got rights to the entire Irving Berlin songbook. "They’ve added Blue Skies, it’s just really incredible music and the songbook is extraordinary and it delivers.

She is also keen to be in the Neptune version instead of the Toronto production, a clone of the American hit production which debuted in 2004 in San Francisco.

"I’d never worked in the Maritimes before and not wanting to be slotted into a production that’s already been done and to be part of a process when you’re creating it yourself appealed to me."

"The reputation of Neptune across the country you know they’re going to do good work," says Stephen.

"My sister (Ronalda) and her husband went to Dal and worked here at Neptune 100 years ago," says Robin. In a Neptune hallway there’s a photograph of her brother-in-law, Peter MacDonald, with Brent Carver in Man of La Mancha. "I’ve always wanted to work here."

This is Laird’s first time at Neptune Theatre and his first time in Nova Scotia.

"I’m really excited to be here," he says. "We’ve already been to Peggy’s Cove and Lunenburg. We’ve had two great Nova Scotia day trips."

"We went to Costco for diapers!" says Stephen.

He and Robin have a 14-month-old son named Hutton Patterson. They met as musical theatre students at Sheridan College "1,000 years ago," says Robin. "He was the only straight guy I graduated with."

"She had no choice," says Stephen.

"I snapped him up," says Robin. They were married in 1999 and moved to Stratford from Toronto a year ago. Dayna and Laird both started out at the Stratford Festival in the 2002 season. They’ve been together as a couple for three years and a year ago bought a house just outside Stratford.

The four became friends through Dayna, a Vancouver actor whose first job when she moved to Ontario was in the Theatre Orangeville production of War Brides — A Musical in 1998. Stephen was also in that show and she commuted with him to Orangeville after her agent gave her Stephen’s number. That’s how she met Robin.

"People used to tell me I looked like Robin," she says. (She still does.)

Dayna, Laird and Robin have worked extensively at Stratford, with Laird and Robin appearing opposite each other in Hello Dolly. Stephen was Marius in the Broadway and touring companies of Les Miserables and Laurie in the US National Tour of Little Women.

The four are fast friends. Dayna and Laird are "our lifeline," says Robin. "We’re home with a baby." (This is her first part since giving birth.)

"They stop by and let us talk like adults," says Stephen.

There is also a third couple in White Christmas, Halifax’s Krista Leis and Randy Ganne. That suits a show that is "about falling in love," says Kash, "and it’s about loyalty."

"All the principles in the show have a journey to happiness. It’s very "50s, very optimistic, very post-war, very Hollywood. I don’t think Halifax has seen anything quite like this before."