You Scream, I Scream, We All Scream for

Posted by Bruce Miller

It was a dark and stormy night, on stage and in the “real world,” as we kicked off the fall season at Barksdale Hanover Tavern with tonight’s opening of Deathtrap by Ira Levin. After directing last fall’s successful production of Agatha Christie’s whodunnit, The Mousetrap, John Moon returned to direct this fall’s thriller, Deathtrap. He's done a terrific job. We’ve yet to decide which trap will be used to ensnare John’s services for next season.

Screams and laughs accompanied all the flashes of lightning and claps of thunder as John’s talented cast kept things edgy until the final curtain. Michael Goodwin made a terrific Barksdale debut in the leading role of has-been playwright Sydney Bruhl. One of our nation’s finest actors, Mike has built a stellar career at Seattle Rep, the Guthrie in Minneapolis, Arena Stage in D. C., the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco, the Long Wharf in New Haven, and the New York Shakespeare Festival under Joseph Papp. Broadway credits include A Patriot for Me, Cyrano, Ambassador, and a revival of Charley’s Aunt. TV credits include recurring roles on Dynasty, Falcon Crest, St. Elsewhere, McGyver and Matlock, among many others.

Christopher Evans returned from New York to rejoin his Barksdale family in the role of novice playwright Clifford Anderson. Chris appeared with us before in The Full Monty, Melissa Arctic, Fifth of July, and Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde. He even filled in for a week in the lead role of Paul Bratter in last year’s Barefoot in the Park.

Robin Arthur, Jacqueline Jones and ‘Rick Gray round out the cast of potential murderers and/or murderees. Robin is well remembered at Willow Lawn for her role as Vera Charles in Mame, and she counts among her Hanover Tavern credits everything from Nunsense to Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie. Jackie starred in Das Barbecu, the last show before the start of Barksdale’s ten-year hiatus from the Tavern in 1996, and Over the River and Through the Woods, one of the shows in the first season back at the Tavern in 2006. ‘Rick makes a point to come play with us every six years or so, having last appeared at Barksdale in my 2001 production of The Little Foxes at Willow Lawn.

Sharing in the Opening Night festivities were Barksdale Board members Rick Arenstein and Kevin Kilgore, and longtime supporters Roy Burgess and Ed Ramsey. Steve Moore and Derek Phipps, two of the poker playing pals from The Odd Couple, came back to experience life on the other side of the footlights. Chase Kniffen and his mom, Bev Kniffen, were overheard making book during intermission as to who on stage was and who wasn’t who or what they seemed to be. Brad Tuggle, our able stage manager, and Alex Whiteway, his weapon wielding assistant, hovered over the food tables at the post-show party, glad that their responsibilities had gone off without a hitch. Terrie Powers (my wife) beamed with pride as crowds of fans congratulated her on another fantastic set.
(From left to right: Michael Goodwin, 'Rick Gray, Brad Tuggle, Chris Evans, Jackie Jones, John Moon and Robin Arthur)

If you weren’t there for Opening, you have six weeks to get caught in the Deathtrap before it becomes just another scream in the night. After breaking all records as the longest-running thriller in Broadway history (5 years), Deathtrap promises to be a hot Barksdale ticket during this most haunting time of year.

It was a great Opening. Hope you’ll call 282-2620 for your tickets today!

--Bruce Miller

My Lunch with Arthur Miller

Posted by Bruce Miller

Four years before Phil Whiteway and I started Theatre IV, I worked summer stock in Southbury, Connecticut. The year was 1971, and I had just finished my junior year at the University of Richmond. None of us knew it at the time, but many if not most of the wonderful summer stock theatres that had thrived throughout New England for over 30 years were on their last legs. After the glory days of the 40s, 50s and 60s, true summer stock theatres were fast becoming a thing of the past.

A true summer stock theatre—at least this is how it was explained to me—produced ten shows in ten weeks, or twelve shows in twelve weeks. During each one week run, the show ran for eight performances, opening on a Tuesday and closing Sunday night.

If you worked for an official straw hat theatre (named for the fashionable headgear that gentlemen donned when the temperatures began to rise), the acting companies were booked in. They brought their own costumes and hand props, and the theatre built the sets and provided lights and sound. If you worked for a summer stock company that wasn’t a part of the official straw hat circuit—the Southbury Summer Playhouse wasn’t—then you created everything from scratch and nothing was booked in. The actors were part of a rep company, half of whom did nothing but act while the other half acted occasionally and worked their donkeys off every minute they weren’t on stage.

Our ten shows at Southbury in the summer of ’71 were Arsenic and Old Lace, Barefoot in the Park, Boys in the Band, Bus Stop, Cactus Flower, The Mousetrap, See How They Run, Under the Yum Yum Tree, West Side Story, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? At least that’s what my fading memory tells me they were. I was the props master for all ten shows, I helped out with any and everything else as needed, I played a lead in See How They Run and tiny supporting parts in Arsenic and Cactus.

The work was grueling, pretty much 9 a.m. until midnight or 1 seven days a week. Our only off time was Wednesday from noon until 6, when about 12 of us would pile into two cars and drive into NYC to buy standing room tickets to a Broadway hit. There was no TKTS booth, but standing room cost only $3, if memory serves.

I had the time of my life!

Even in those days when summer stock theatres were still fairly plentiful, jobs were hard to come by. You more or less had to know someone. I knew my college roommate and best pal Rick Gehr from Binghamton, New York. Rick knew his high school buddy Richard Ebeling, who had somehow managed to get a job at Southbury in 1970, and was not returning in ’71. Ebeling put in a good word for Gehr, and Gehr put in a good word for me. Rick Gehr and I took a bus up to Southbury to interview and audition with the producer, W. Thomas Littleton, and we both were cast.

We were paid $75 a week, and each of us paid $25 a week to rent a bed from Mr. and Mrs. Anderson, who owned a big white frame house about ten minutes up the road in Woodbury (pictured to the left). If we wanted to eat dinner at the Andersons, that was an additional $3 per meal. All in all, we scraped by.

I have a million stories, but one of my favorites involved Arthur Miller, who lived about 8 minutes away in Roxbury. That's his house in the picture to the right. Early in our 12-week contract, one of the locals drove us around to visit the houses of the famous people who were our neighbors in the Litchfield Hills—Arthur Miller, Alexander Calder, Jerzy Kosinsky, William Styron, John Updike, Richard Widmark, Sylvia Sidney, etc. Today you can add Dustin Hoffman, Frank McCourt and Stephen Sondheim to the list.

When we got to Arthur Miller’s house, I was stunned to see that his mailbox had Miller written on it in big block letters just like my parents’ mailbox at home in Virginia. I made them stop the car and take my picture next to the mailbox. I have no idea where that photo is today. Behind and to the side of Miller's white frame house is the studio he build in the late 40s, pictured above and to the left. It was in this studio that he wrote Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, and most of his other great plays.

Anyway, one day I was taking a lunch break from my desperate search for free props, and I sat down at the lunch counter at Canfield Corner Pharmacy in Woodbury. I was sitting by myself eating a sandwich when a man in his 50s sat down on the counter stool next to me. The man who ran the lunch counter came over and said, “Hello, Mr. Miller.” I looked up, thinking he was talking to me, and wondering how he knew my name. It was instantly obvious from his gaze that he was talking to the fellow sitting next to me. I glanced over just long enough to realize that the man sitting five inches from my elbow was none other than the legendary Arthur Miller himself. He ordered a corn beef on rye, and we sat there silently until both of us had eaten our sandwiches and he went on his way. I never had the nerve to say anything, but I tried to soak it all in as much as I could.

Last week, I took my family back up to Southbury, Woodbury, Roxbury and Washington CT. Washington made the list because it’s the neighboring town that served as the inspiration for Stars Hollow on one of my family's favorite TV shows, The Gilmore Girls. The interior and signage of Crossroads Cafe, the diner that served as a model for Luke's on The G G, are featured in the photos to the left and right. As you can see, the church is across the street in Washington just as it is in Stars Hollow.

Unfortunately, the barn that served as home to the Southbury Summer Playhouse was torn down decades ago, but we still had a grand time visiting my old haunts.

While there, we stopped in a framing shop in Woodbury to ask for directions to Alexander Calder’s house, and met with a lovely young lady who asked if I knew Bill C. Davis. I told her that I’d just met him at the world premiere of Austin’s Bridge at the Firehouse in Richmond, and that he seemed very nice. Turns out she’s his hiking partner, and he now lives in that part of the world as well. She told me that he really is the nicest guy in the world, and asked me all about what I thought about Austin’s Bridge. I shared my opinions, and referred her to my earlier entry in this blog.

It was a great trip, and a wonderful chance to remember again my lunch with Arthur Miller.

--Bruce Miller

A Journeyman Arrives

The day has finally come. After talking about this production for over a year, I am finally producing Harold Pinter's The Dumb Waiter in the Little Theatre in the Historic Empire Theatre complex. Many people have been asking "Why is he doing a show in the Little Theatre if it has been closed?" The answer to this is that I have just completed a "Journeyman's Year" where I was half-intern and half-employee. Part of my compensation for doing this year was the use of the Little Theatre. (You may remember Chase Kniffen's production of Godspell in the space. That production was done under the same agreement.) Our production was originally scheduled for February, but both David Janeski (who plays the role of Gus) and I were given the opportunity to work on Smoke on the Mountain at Barksdale Theatre at Hanover Tavern (I as assistant director and David as Dennis, one of the twins- "he's the boy") and couldn't pass up that opportunity. It turns out for the best because now that the show is going up in August, Carl Calabrese is able to join the cast as Ben.

Carl, David, and I attended Longwood University together, Carl graduating one year after I. Though he is new to the Richmond scene, Carl is sure to be loved by all. The Dumb Waiter is the third show in which I have directed Carl; the other two being The Skin of Our Teeth by Thornton Wilder and The Brute by Anton Chekhov, Carl having played the lead in both. Another interesting fact: Carl and I played opposite each other as the Antipholus twins in Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors at Longwood.

David and I have worked on several shows together over the last year including two shows at Barksdale Theatre at Hanover Tavern: Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap and the aforementioned Smoke on the Mountain, as well as Bill C. Davis' new work, Austin's Bridge, at the Firehouse Theatre Project.

To give a brief overview: The Dumb Waiter is a time-honored classic of the absurdist theatre, written in 1960 by Harold Pinter, who would later go on to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2005. This dark comedy is the story of two contract killers waiting in a basement for their next job. Tension runs high due to decidedly contrasting personalities and it only escalates as they are sent encoded commands through an old dumb waiter. The twisting tale is sure to leave you guessing until the very last moments, and it's shocking conclusion! (Dun-Dun-Dun).

This process has been incredibly enjoyable and enlightening. Outside of the obvious duties of a director, so many other things fall onto one's plate when one decides to independently produce a show. From sending out press releases, to painting the set and rigging lights, everything comes at a rapid pace. I have been very fortunate to have many wonderful people give me and advice and help me immensely.

Thank you to Sara, Judi, Wendy, Jessica, both Bruce's, Phil, Catherine, Billy Christopher, and everyone else at Barksdale/Theatre IV who have donated their time to help with things that I could never have done on my own.


Also see the article that appeared in the August 1 STYLE Weekly.


Brad Tuggle
Assistant to the Managing Director