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Theatre Workshop
The island juggernaut turns 50 this week with a Sconset Casino blowout
by marli guzzetta
Subsisting some years on little more than passion and grease paint, the nonprofit Theatre Workshop of
Nantucket has overcome near bankruptcy, the 'Nantucket Shuffle' and even fire to make it 50 years, an accomplishment that will be celebrated at the Sconset Casino on Monday night.
Stand-up comic Kevin Flynn (whose show is cancelled due to the celebration) hosts the event, which begins with a theatrical tribute - or overture if you will - to the community theater that got its start hosting winter shows at the Straight Wharf Theatre under the guidance of its first artistic director, Mac Dixon.
"He's the one who put together the Theatre Workshop as we know it," said Reggie Levine, Nantucket Arts Council President. "He was able to bring to his role as artistic director a really quite extraordinary background. But he made every effort to involve as much of the community as possible, and that's what gave it its flavor ... He also had a wonderful capacity to work with people and bring out hidden talents. He was a sweet, kind and generous person, but no nonsense. He considered this a professional theatre and instilled the professionalism in the group."
Whereas now TWN shows run for weeks at a time, Dixon's performers rehearsed for months for only three performances of shows like "The Diary of Anne Frank" and the operetta "The Mikado."
Over its first two decades, Dixon and company expanded the breadth of the TWN's activities to include year-round performances as well as classes by Broadway-trained talent - forgoing equity status to remain a community theatre.
And it really became a theatre in and around the whole community. When a mysterious fire claimed Straight Wharf, the only theatre on Nantucket (see Timeline page 38), the TWN lost its home and began a creative shuffle that would take it through homes, barns and churches. When Dixon retired and named Richard Cary his successor in 1980, TWN was in a precarious place - running winter shows in the First Congregational Church's Bennett Hall, which was, for all definitive purposes, more of a gym than a theatre.
Under Cary's watch, the TWN negotiated a long-term lease for Bennett Hall and renovated it into a proper theatre. The four years that Cary was at the TWN helm saw the genesis of the Nantucket Dance Company and the Armchair Theater - a potluck dinner that includes a play reading - as well as the return to summer performances.
"There was a pragmatic resistance to starting summer theatre again," said Cary, taking time out from renovating "a glorious, two-story brick house" in Asheville, N.C. "It's difficult starting summer theater on Nantucket, because so much of the island is employed overtime. So what I tried doing at first was increasing winter plays. And it seemed like it was such good stuff, I asked the casts if they'd like to remount it for the summer. ... So generally we got community theatre up and running in the summer, and it was very successful."
During his tenure, some of the TWN's best performances included "The Time of Your Life," "Death of a Salesman," "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum," "The Fantasticks" and "Zoo Story" (with selectman Michael Kopko).
In 1984, Cary left TWN to form Actors Theatre and was replaced by S. Warren Krebs, a man whose relationship with TWN began years prior, when Mac Dixon cast him as Col. Pickering in "My Fair Lady," according to Krebs widow, Anna Jane Krebs.
 | | Top, from left: Mac Dixon often said that the "Diary of Ann Frank" (1961) was one of TWN's best performances during his tenure; Mac Dixon (right) playing with unknown actor in "The Emperor's New Clothes" (1966); The cast of "Rain" making their curtain call (1963). Above, left: Mac Dixon, founding artistic director of Theatre Workshop of Nantucket. |
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"The days that Warren spent acting in and directing plays for TWN were some of the most challenging, rewarding and happy days of his life. Warren was constantly striving to achieve a degree of perfection, and he demanded 100 percent and more of all those who worked with him on a production," she said. "Warren was constantly amazed at the incredible talent that the Nantucket community provided and the willingness of those involved in the theatre to be fully committed to providing the Nantucket community with the best entertainment possible. There is a bond that people have when they work together in the theatre, and Warren cherished the many friendships that he forged during his involvement with TWN. ... It gave him, as well as others, a place to fulfill his dream of acting and directing."
 | | Richard Cary, director of the Theatre Workshop from 1980 to 1984. |
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When the Krebses moved to be closer to Anna's mother in 1997, the TWN decided to sail without an artistic director for a while. (Kate Stout served as the TWN's next artistic director, from 2001 to 2004.)
A year after Krebs left, TWN got word that the First Congregational Church needed Bennett Hall back again for its own activities.
"We were looking everywhere, and couldn't find anything because everything is so expensive," remembered Pam Murphy, TWN president and board member since 2002.
Knowing time was running out, TWN caught something of a break in 2004. Just after Stout left Nantucket, Richard Cary decided to close Actors Theatre, which was operating out of the Methodist Church.
"He had been in that space for 20 years and decided he was done," Murphy said. "And this light went off in my head. At the time, I was the vice president, and I said, 'We gotta move. We gotta move, and we gotta take Jane.'"
"Jane" is Jane Karakula, Cary's right hand man at the Actors Theatre ("the best right hand man anyone could want," Cary said).
"When we came in here, we spent a lot of money on the new seating and the air conditioning and improving the hallways," said Murphy. And it was money well spent. With a more aggressive marketing approach, a talented creative director who knows what the summer audiences like, an experienced board of directors and the addition of Actors Theatre talent and following, the TWN spent 2005 in the black. "It was a really strong season - the first time we'd broken even in five years," Murphy said.
And so begins (for now) something of a Pax Theatrica for TWN, which is a more valuable organization for its scrapes and bruises, according to board member Jenny Ahlborn.
"The more you push people to be creative within parameters, the deeper they delve," said Ahlborn, who said the true testament to the TWN is not in the quality of its performances, but in its tenacity.
"I think the biggest success is the fact that the theater has existed 50 years when it looked like for a number of times that wasn't going to happen," she said. "Enough people were interested in theater and in devoting enough time to set up a community theater so when the finances were not very good, people were not willing to throw in the towel."
I
TIMELINE
1939: Margaret Fawcett Barnes starts Fawcett Players and buys Straight Wharf Theatre.
1956: Theatre Workshop of Nantucket is founded with Mac Dixon as its director; TWN offers classes as well as winter performances.
1957: TWN is incorporated by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
1960: The TWN offers no performances because it's decided that the community would benefit if Mac Dixon returned to New York to attend a professional course on community theater.
1962: TWN negotiates with Margaret Fawcett Wilson a long-term lease for winter performances at Straight Wharf.
1966: Margaret Fawcett Wilson sells Straight Wharf to Walter Beinecke's development company, Sherburne and Associates; she does so with the stipulation that, for at least 10 years, TWN be able to use the Straight Wharf year-round and rent-free.
1967: Because of Wilson's deal, the TWN is able to hold its first summer season.
1968: TWN begins monthly lectures on theatre, makeup, lighting, etc.
1971: TWN offers a formal training program for performance, with Wednesday Showcases
1973: TWN performs 12 months out of the year, and also begins a program collaborating with local schools.
John Wulp creates Nantucket Stage Company, a summer-stock equity theater group that performs at Cyrus Peirce Middle School.
1974: Nantucket Stage Company begins negotiations with Sherburne Associates and signs a lease for sole use of the Straight Wharf Theatre, which will force TWN to return to winter performances only. Nantucket Stage Company makes plans to renovate Straight Wharf Theatre and asks TWN to remove all possessions, including theater seats, from the Straight Wharf Theatre.
1975: On the morning of April 19, the Nantucket Stage Company receives the keys to the Straight Wharf Theatre.
At 8:30 p.m. that night, a call goes out to NFD - someone sees a fire in the Straight Wharf theater, which burns to unusable cinders by the next morning. The cause is officially labeled "undetermined." The whole summer season is cancelled. The Nantucket Stage company approaches TWN with the invitation to "combine forces" and build a new theater; the TWN board declines.
TWN rents Bennett Hall at First Congregation Church on a short-term basis for a Thanksgiving performance. The TWN will rent Bennett Hall for its performances for the next five years.
1976: TWN purchases the Twin Street Barn to be a rehearsal space, costume and prop storage and shop.
1980: Mac Dixon retires, naming Richard Cary as replacement. TWN negotiates a long-term lease at Bennett Hall; Cary spearheads the renovation of Bennett Hall from gym to theatre.
1982: Armchair Theater begins.
1983: TWN reintroduces summer theater.
1984: Richard Cary resigns as TWN artistic director and starts Actors Theatre
1985:Warren Krebs becomes artistic director; a working artist, he takes no salary but does not direct all the shows either, which means the board begins paying its directors.
1990s: TWN starts the short play festival
1997: Krebs resigns; operating without artistic director, the TWN sells Twin Street Barn and puts money into CDs for the purpose of establishing permanent home
1998: TWN renovates Bennett Hall
1999: Donation made to TWN for artistic director salary
2000: Board holds national search for new artistic director
2001: TWN chooses Kate Stout for artistic director
2002: TWN told needed to find new space
2004: Kate Stout resigns; Richard Cary closes Actors Theatre, TWN moves to its current location at the Methodist Church.
Jane Karakula becomes artistic director
2005: TWN has first season in the black in five years
2006: TWN celebrates its 50th anniversary
Timeline details provided by TWN board member and former president Jennifer Ahlborn, whose article on the TWN, "Curtains Rising: The First Fifty Years of the Theatre Workshop of Nantucket," will appear in the Auust issue of the NHA's "Historic Nantucket."
SCHEDULE
TWN'S 50TH ANNIVERSARY GALA: CELEBRATING 50 YEARS OF BRINGING
LIVE THEATRE TO NANTUCKET! When: Monday, July 31 Where: 'Sconset Casino, New Street ('Sconset) Cost: $125 (Raffle tickets are three for $10.) To purchase tickets, call 228-4305 or visit the boxoffice
in the Methodist Church, 2 Centre Street. For more information visit www.theatreworkshop.com
5:30 p.m.
Act I: Cocktails by Cisco Brewers and lots of hearty food by A Taste of Nantucket outside on the deck of the Casino.
7:30 p.m.
Act II: A theatrical tribute to our 50-year history. Comedian Kevin Flynn of New York and Nantucket fame will emcee as TWN performers from the past reprise selected parts from shows from all five decades. Scheduled to appear are: John Shea, known to all for his TV and film career and who made his performing debut in the 70s at the Theatre Workshop. Piano genius Jamie Howarth joins Bob Lehman, Nantucket's favorite tenor and entertainer reprising songs from Oklahoma, The Fantastiks, and HMS Pinafore to name a few. Neville Richen will direct Alix Kopko in Blue. Lia Newman performs a part from Really Rosie. Also appearing are Jim Nettles, Patty Kepenash, Laurel Devaney, John Devaney, Meredith Martin, Annie Breeding and more.
8:15-8:30 p.m.
Act III: Our Raffle Drawing! Win a theater weekend in New York City at the Carlyle Hotel with tickets to Broadway shows, backstage passes and travel from Nantucket; a Dine-Around Nantucket package - indulge at many of Nantucket's finest eating establishments; A Shop Around Nantucket Package - spoil yourself at Nantucket's finest shops with gift certificates and discounts!; Two passes to the 2007 Nantucket Film Festival - full admission to everything!; Two passes to the Nantucket Wine Festival
Finale: Cake and a champagne Toast to the TWN 'company' of 50 years
Encore: An informal 'gam' with TWN celebrities telling tales of triumph and tragedy on the TWN stage. Bring your stories to share!
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