Gateway Playhouse is in Bellport, NY a small village on the Great South Bay of Long Island.
It is similar, but smaller, to Sayville the town where I grew up about ten miles away.
In addition to the Playhouse, Bellport is also the original home of Grucci Fireworks:
One of the early inventors of the Ball Bearing also lived in Bellport and I would pass a small monument whenever I walked into town.
I did not always find the town to be very friendly and I remember one store had signs aimed at the Gateway staff that simply said to buy something or leave.
As with all summer theatres we were always busy and had little free time to go into town anyway.
The technical staff had a big surprise on the opening night of the first show.
No, we were not served beans and franks, but told that we had to help park cars.
Normally the crew would be checking everything and getting ready for the show to begin, but no we had to go out and direct the cars into the back parking lot and then run in just before the show was to start.
Of course we were not happy doing this but had a big laugh when someone managed to drive onto a telephone pole used as a divider between the rows of cars.
The first play of the season was “West Side Story” and I was running the fly system.
The Gateway Theatre was the old style “Hemp House” (NO not that kind of hemp) that used sand bags and not the counterweights in common use today.
One night the 16 year old high school student who was suppose to be helping me came running in late, tripped and knocked me into the fly rail hurting my ribs.
The same thing happened on the crew the year before and someone’s ribs were broken.
With a sand bag system if you let go of the rope the scenery on the other end will fall onto the stage.
I was lucky not to be hurt too bad and I was able to hold on and the show went on.
All in all we had a good working report with each other backstage and enjoyed what free time we had.
We turned the back entry to the Theatre into our crew porch on which we relaxed before and after the shows drinking cold sodas and telling "War Stories" of our adventures in other Theatres.
From time to time I shared my late night roof perch with some of the crew and a few beers while sitting up there unwinding after a show.
I even got to use the company pool once in a while, but do not get too jealous, you have not seen the pool, or should I say cement bathtub.
The best use of the pool was the day that the Assistant Technical Director, ATD, and I tossed the owner’s 16 year old son into the pool.
Of course his dad would walk around the corner just after little “Paulie” was sent into the water but he laughed, shook his head and just walked away.
When I tell a few more of the stories of the adventures of the two 16 year old boys you will know why we tossed him in and wonder why we did not do it sooner.
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