When Suzy Shepard, Stonington hair stylist and fisherman’s wife and mother came to the first tryout for Fiddler On The Roof back in 2000, she never planned to try out for a part.
Shepard saw the ad in the local paper, Island Ad-Vantages, and was curious because she knew the story of the musical. “I hadn’t been in a school play since 6th grade and thought, ‘I’ll sit in the back row and watch.'”
She came in, sat down, and saw some people she knew and some she didn’t. Then someone passed out music. Nelson Monteith, director of the Reach Performing Arts Center, started to play piano and asked everyone to sing, so they all sang, without stopping to think about it.
Monteith next split them into sections and resumed playing. “Nelson stood in the middle of the stage and said, ‘Welcome to Cabin Fever. You all just tried out.’ I didn’t know what hit me!” said Shepard. “We were all so happy,” she said. “He had made everyone feel accepted, good enough.”
Monteith has been making islanders of all ages feel as welcome as Shepard since his first production, Oliver, which christened the Reach center, a 400-seat, air-conditioned, handicap-accessible theater built in 2000, and located at the Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School.
Lobster fisherman Robin Dunham feels the same way. He responded to the same ad Shepard did and said, “I had wanted to be in a play and sing publicly for years, but never did. No outlet for it. Didn’t want to do it professionally, but for fun.” He said that Fiddler On The Roof was a perfect opportunity. From that first night of tryouts, all the men started growing beards. “People around town would ask why we were growing beards,” he said. “It was the best advertisement.”
That feeling Monteith instills of being accepted, good enough, encourages people want to try out for each musical he directs. As Shepard said, ” He makes you feel very warm and confident, and you want to work yourself to death for him.”
The idea for the Reach started in the mid-1990s, when 20 community members began planning the new elementary school. Susan Steed, a special education teacher and parent of a theater-loving son, wanted a stage that wasn’t in a gym, but she and others soon found that the state would not fund such a plan. It would be up to them.
Between donations, grants, and “sweat equity,” they raised $800,000 and built a theater with what Steed calls a brilliant design where everything makes sense down to garage-size doors for moving stage sets in and out.
Though built primarily for school children, theater activities include all ages and every islander can take part in, learn, and enjoy all the Reach offers.
The Reach collaborates with island organizations to offer islanders a remarkable range of resources and opportunities.
Each summer, The Reach joins with Seamark Community Arts and Opera House Arts for an annual weeklong arts day camp. Steed, camp director, said 96 children from post-kindergarten to post-eighth grade attend Arts Camp, including many summer residents. Elizabeth Nevells, Reach Steering Committee and Island Fishermen’s Wives Association (IFWA) member, noted that it’s a good way for island and summer children to become acquainted and make friends.
Reach musical productions take actors and stagehands from third grade up. Nevells’ son, Elliott, 10, who played The Artful Dodger in the second, recent production of Oliver, has been attending Arts Camp for five years.
But maintaining a first class theater and director costs money. Suzanne Ruch, Reach Steering Committee chair for the past three years, said the theater can be rented for any kind of activity with a contract through Monteith.
For the last two years, the Reach has offered 10 waivers or grants for the usual rental fee, first come first served, and an annual community choral medley of Broadway music takes place at the Reach. All proceeds go for scholarships to students pursuing arts-related education. Healthy Island Project rents the Reach for Friday activities of its annual three-day “Winterfest” to lure islanders out of hibernation with all kinds of activities.
Ruch said the Steering Committee is always trying to think of events to draw people to the Reach, and as an example said, “We collaborated with the [Island Fishermen’s] Wives for an evening of story telling last year.” They packed the house for Lobstah Tales, local fishermen and women telling fishing stories, and split the proceeds between the Island’s Heating Assistance Program and its food pantry. “It was a real collaborative community effort,” Ruch said. “It’s always wonderful to look out at the audience at the Reach and see all aspects of the community participating in the event.”
This also happens during annual Cabin Fever musicals, which Monteith started his second year, which Ruch said embodies the Reach mission statement to involve the community.
That component is all-inclusive. Steed said that because of Monteith, “We have special needs kids who are now adults who are in all our plays, who sing, and dance, and have a ball; every single production we’ve done.” This year’s production is The Sound of Music.
“One thing I love about this,” said Shepard, about Reach musicals, “you’re with a different circle of people. I’ve made some really good friends.”
Shepard noted that when people come for try outs, it’s hard for Monteith to calm them down because they’re all socializing. She explained, “This is the only time I see certain people.” Shepard is a founding member of IFWA.
Fiddler on the Roof, Monteith’s first musical for adults, Steed said, “Brought everyone out of the woodwork: Frank Gotwals, a fisherman, the town doctor, parents, teachers.” She said, “One of the school board members who had been on the building committee and who was dead set against the theater from the beginning said, ‘I never knew what community meant until I saw all those different people up on that stage.'”
“I think the Reach is a great thing and that’s why I’ve been involved,” Steed said. “Nelson Monteith is an incredibly charismatic, gifted talented teacher. One of those one in a million teachers you come across. And to watch him with children would bring tears to your eyes. He is so tender with them and funny and encouraging and just, ‘You can do it.’ He has been a gift to the island.”
The Sound of Music will be performed in March. For more information, go to http://rpac.homestead.com or call Nelson Monteith 348-6301, ext. 227.