Requiem for a WHAT
My journey there from 1987 to 2011
So, the news broke yesterday that Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater is no more. Last Saturday, I was on the WHAT stage as part of a staged reading of a new play, “The Shallows,” by my old friend Jim Frangione. (The Shallows is the sequel to Jim’s “Flight of the Monarch,” which we did at Gloucester Stage in 2017.) It was supposed to be a kind of audition to see if it might find its way into the 2026 season. Lovely play. Immensely talented cast. The audience response was rapturous. Chris Ostrom said afterward that, in the best of all possible worlds, we would do Monarch in the fall and Shallows next spring. Instead, it looks like Saturday’s reading will be the last time I am on the WHAT stage. After almost 40 years.
The first show I saw at WHAT was in 1987: “Greater Tuna” with Stephen Russell and Gip Hoppe. Gip had already hired me to direct Sam Shepard’s “A Lie of the Mind” later that fall. I had seen Tuna at Circle in the Square in NYC (free tickets from Equity). Actually, I walked out at intermission. I was like, what the hell is this cornpone entertainment? At WHAT it was somehow miraculous. Gip in a yellow pantsuit flipping imaginary pancakes was pee your pants hilarious. The tiny space with wooden folding chairs was perfect. I knew I was in the right place.
“Lie” went well. Dan Joy showed up to audition and landed the role of Mike. A week into rehearsals, he handed me a set design sketch, and I was like “oh shit.” (He was our resident set and poster designer for the next 18 years.) The original 6 founding members, including Dan Walker, Kevin Rice, and Dick Morrill (who came up with the WHAT moniker), had been reduced to 3, with another 2 on the way out. Gip invited me back to help run the place. He got an actor/director/carpenter. I got an artistic home.
We grew. Fast. The Boston papers started covering us (thank you, John Koch, Ed Seigel, Terry Byrne, Louise Kennedy). By the late 90s, we were packing them in nightly. The Town was threatening to shut us down for building violations, so we started a campaign to build a new theater. 5 years and 7 million dollars (raised and borrowed) later, we opened the 220-seat Julie Harris Stage on Route 6. The Boston Globe called it an “architectural gem.” (Thank you, John Freeman.) Julie Harris was our honorary Board chair and also starred in “The Beauty Queen of Leenane,” which I directed - a career pinnacle. Carol Green was our Board President and Angel. We kept the Harbor running – I asked Brendan Hughes to be its “Impresario” – and also put up a big top tent for “WHAT 4 Kids” run by Stephen Russell behind the Julie. On any given night, we might have up to 400 paying customers in 3 venues. I would do a curtain speech at the Harbor, jump on my bike, and make it up to the Julie to do another curtain speech there. During the 2008 season, we mounted 10 full productions plus WHAT 4 kids and a couple of bookings. Good times.
We were never star-driven or even seeking. Occasionally, a director would pitch me a project that came with stars attached. Almost always, those actors would not materialize. I came to call that the “Hollywood Mirage.” Our strength was in the top-notch, professional actors who were drawn to work with us because of the material. Many of those were truly “working actors” with pro credits galore, including Broadway, film, and TV, even if they weren’t stars. They came from New York and Boston, and many were local but no less talented. They had to be to hold their own: Ramona Alexander, Elizabeth Atkeson, Michael Balcanoff, Paul Benedict, Kate Buddeke, Paul Butler, Tommy Day Carey, Marc Carver, Reg E. Cathey, Julia Chan, Ken Cheeseman Erin Cherry, Casey Clark, Tanya Clarke, Amanda Collins, Annie Combs, Winslow Corbett, Kim Crocker, Dennis Cunningham, Ron Daniels, Darian Dauchan, Jerome Davis, Danielle Delgado, D’Arcy Dersham, Art Devine, Andy Dolan, Mike Dorval, Deanna Dunmyer, Laura Esterman, Mack Exilus, Ramsey Faragallah, Jonathan Fielding, Stacy Fischer, David Fraioli, Robin Galloway, Vince Gatton, Colin Hamell, Rachel Harker, Adam Harrington, Gip Hoppe, Neal Huff, Holly Hudson, Birgit Huppuch, Tom Jahnke, Thomas Kee, Adam Klem, Robert Kropf, Adrianne Hewlett Krstansky, Johnny Kuntz, Gabriel Kuttner, Caitlin Gibbon Langstaff, Paula Langton, Laura Latreille, Kristina Lear, Teresa Avia Lim, Rebecca Lowman, Lizbeth MacKay, Barry Magnani, Rebekah Maggor, Lou Maloof, Kelly Mares, Bethany Ann McDonald, Richard McElvain, Annie McNamara, Stephen Mellor, Bill Mevis, Dick Morrill, McNeely Myers, Lordan Napoli, David Nelson, Deirdre O’Connell, Michael Ornstein, Erik Parrillo, Judith Partelow, Pedro Pascal (yes, that Pedro Pascal), Maria Pechukas, Julie Perkins, Florence Phillips, Jessica Pimentel, Lee Roscoe, Stephen Russell, Michael Saari, Bob Seay, Jay Sefton, Peggy Shaw, Frank Speiser, Nina Schuessler, Vanessa Spina, Marina Squerciati, Tom Stephens, Hal Streib, Shaun Sturnick, Jimmy Tingle, Daisy Walker, Charles E. Weinstein, Lewis D. Wheeler, Bates Wilder, Brenda Withers, Heather Glenn Wixson, Susan Winslow, Ruby Wolf, and forgive me if I left you out. We also had wonderful resident designers: Ben Arons, Jiyoun Chang, Evan Farley, J. Hagenbuckle, the aforementioned Dan Joy, Nancy Lawrence, Nathan Leigh, John Malinowski, Robin McLaughlin, Chris Ostrom, and Andala Schumacher, Carol Meehan Sherry, Stage and production managers, Victoria Coady, Jeffry George, Kevin Hardy, Lucia Huntley and Katie Most, were essential.
Then came the worldwide financial crash of 2008. The WHAT Board understandably became nervous and “suggested” that we broaden our programming. I complied while also fiercely defending our brand as “the summer theater that doesn’t do summer theatre.” We mounted “Laughing Wild”, “Noises Off”, and “Boeing Boeing”, but also “The Vibrator Play”, “Danny Casolaro Died for You”, “Jihad Jones and the Kalashnikov Babes”, and “A Behanding in Spokane.” Long story short, my time at WHAT ended after the 2011 season.
That was 15 years ago.
Since then? I’ll leave it to others to tell the tale. I know COVID was a body blow to all theaters everywhere. Federal money poured in to plug the financial holes, but audiences never quite came back. Also – and this trend had started long before Covid – the giant flat-screen/Netflix phenomenon had paradigm-shifted the way people thought about consuming culture and entertainment.
The core company of actors that had been doing great work at the Harbor since we opened the Julie in ’07, took over the lease and formed the Harbor Stage Company in 2012, and is still going strong in its 14th season. I’m proud to have been a small part of that as an actor and director.
I don’t know what’s next for WHAT. I hope it has a next chapter as a THEATER. I shudder to think that some corporate entity will swoop in, rip out the seats, and turn it into a CVS. WHAT I know is that there were once TWO professional theatre companies doing excellent, challenging work in the tiny town of Wellfleet, Massachusetts. Now there is one.
A lot has been left out of this narrative, which I have amended and edited numerous times since I first posted it. Plenty of incredible “young” playwrights: Eric Bogosian, Constance Congdon, Gino DiIorio, Dipika Guha, Jennifer Haley, David Johnston, John Kolvenbach, Becky Mode, Michael Klein, Eric Lane,Tracy Letts, David Mamet, Martin McDonagh, Dominic Orlando, Kevin Rice, Sam Shepard, Jeffrey Sweet, Paula Vogel, Gip Hoppe, Eric Lane, Sarah Ruhl, Wendy Wasserstein. Talented directors: Tim Baker, Tina Ball, Rand Foerster, Richard Hamburger, Jesse Jou, Padraic Lillis, Cynthia Stokes, David Wheeler, Allen Zadoff. Very long lists, obviously, and all were/are valued and appreciated.
I have tried to keep myself and my personal life out of it to the extent possible, but it must be said that while it was all going down - not just the 25 years when I was in the saddle, but in the years since - always there beside me, supporting me, encouraging me, putting up with me - was my beautiful life partner, my wife, Crystal, who, yes, also dived in at times to stage manage, make costumes, sell ads, house and feed artists, and was always a creative sounding board. She also made and raised a couple of great kids. So, no, I couldn’t have done it without her. Thank you, Crystal.