His Game of Darts Interrupted; A Night of Theatre Is Saved

By TOM DUNLOP

Fred Natusch of Vineyard Haven was playing darts at the home of a
friend on Lake Tashmoo on Friday evening when the call came in from the
Vineyard Playhouse. It was climbing up toward 8 o'clock, and the
theatre was dark. Not in the showbiz sense of dark, as in there's
no production scheduled here tonight, but in the sense of there would be
a production scheduled here tonight, but the lights aren't
working.

I was rounding the corner of Church street just about the time Mr.
Natusch must have gotten that call. The decision to see The Retreat from
Moscow, by William Nicholson, was one of those impulses that come upon
me during the day and build - impulses I often manage, at the last
moment, to overrule. In hindsight, I'm surprised I carried on with
it, because it was the end of August and, just like you at this point in
the season, I am tired of approximately everything. But rush tickets at
the playhouse are a bargain, and I figured a tough new drama about
divorce, set in Britain, staged in the last week of August on
Martha's Vineyard, might possibly have room for just one more.
Even on a Friday night.

To tell you the truth, as I walked down to the theatre, my pace
slowed and my heart sank. The lights in the lobby were out. I saw
candles burning through the windows and a few couples milling around the
front door in what appeared, at first glance, to be an unhappy mood. Two
words crossed my mind: environmental theatre. I actually stopped 20 feet
shy of the door and came this close to saying the hell with it.

A British couple dismally making tea and buttering toast for two
hours, "getting at" each other, probably quoting Swinburne
or Nelson and wondering all the while whether matters might one day be
"put right"? Well, all right, I came knowing what I might be
in for. But no fair adding to the gloom by staging the thing by
candlelight. Morbidity made me go inside to ask whether there were any
rush tickets left. I was told that there would be if I knew my way
around a fusebox.

Evidently the lights had blown the week before too, but that
blackout had involved the whole block. This one knocked out only the
Playhouse and the church across the street, which was also dark, in the
showbiz sense of the word. Because the outage involved two buildings,
and could not possibly be a problem internal to the Playhouse alone, it
would require an emergency visit by NSTAR, a company I'd never
heard of but whose efficacy I doubted on the instant because it
didn't sound like it even had a whole name. It was ten minutes to
eight. I figured they'd arrive by the following Thursday, and I
turned to leave.

Funny thing was, everybody else was staying. In fact, the crowd was
growing. I sat down in the lobby, a bit puzzled by this, and stared at a
flame. Joann Green Breuer, artistic associate and the director of The
Retreat from Moscow, came in, clasped her hands and gave one of those
speeches directors give when the odds are against them and the only
thing left to bank on is good will.

NSTAR had been called. They were going to hold until 8:30 to see
what would happen. Though she would understand if anyone wanted a
refund, she hoped we would stay until then to see if the show could go
on. We were wonderful, the production was wonderful, it was worth
waiting for, she loved us, and the refreshments were now officially
free.

By my count, not one person left. It may have been the rave review
in the Globe which appeared over the weekend (Mr. Nicholson's play
was getting the incisive production on the Vineyard that it ought to
have gotten in New York, but didn't). It may have been word of
mouth from the run of the previous week. It may have been the
refreshments. But theatergoers were now standing and sitting on both
sides of Church street. Stephen Zablotny, the technical director and set
designer, directed traffic through the crowd. And then the yellow NSTAR
truck showed up. There was a cheer and applause.

In two ticks the orange cones were out on the street, the
searchlights were aiming at the transformer high up in a pole across the
road and Mr. Natusch - who on a peaceful evening could reasonably
have expected that his workday was done, and who was just trying to
carve out some personal time for himself at the end of a busy summer
- was in the lift, headed up. He touched the wire with something
long and plastic. He lived.

So he went higher, and in the spotlight you could see him working
his right arm up and down. There was a small pop, and the upstairs
lights in the church went on. Then the lights in the Playhouse lobby
went on. There was another cheer. Mr. Natusch and his lift whirred to
the ground and as we watched that happen, a man told me that, sure as
shooting, somebody would find an electrocuted squirrel on the church
lawn the following morning. A first sign of the Apocalypse,
Island-style, I thought.

Mr. Natusch says he's a good darts player - not
professional or anything, but good enough to enjoy it - and was in
the middle of that game when the call reached him at Tashmoo that 120 or
so people wanted to see a play over on Church street but couldn't
because there was no light. Say what you will about overtime, Mr.
Natusch could have stretched that out by going slow. But he was on the
scene with his truck and his gear in less than 30 minutes, having
surrendered part of what gives him pleasure so that people he'll
never know could have theirs. And apparently every single person who was
scheduled to see The Retreat from Moscow at 8 p.m. on Friday night hung
around, in faith, to see it start at 8:45. The show was sold out but
there was still one extra ticket for a guy who almost said the hell with
it. Not bad for the end of August.