FINAL TOUR chapter 229

I was in and out of the 1980 Portrait Players summer tour. I really only remember certain parts of the tour. I don’t believe I left at the beginning of the tour with the team. I think I picked them up somewhere in Ontario for the trip to the Maritimes and into New York.

I had never been to Québec and joined them for the stop in Montreal. We had no difficulties there. We could always find someone who spoke English. I had no team members with a French Canadian background and only a couple with a little French from high school. I saw why people were so fascinated with the city. It was clean, beautiful and elegant – at least the parts we saw. Our problems came further east as we were crossing the province heading further east. We had stopped at a place with a McDonalds sign along the highway. We needed food and a restroom. We did not find anyone who spoke or understood English, at least no one who would acknowledge speaking English. Culturally there was a resentment of English Canadians who neither spoke nor understood French. That was certainly us. We managed to order without French, thanks to pictures. A Big Mack looks the same in all languages.

It was along ways to get to the Maritimes. I really wanted to take the ferry to Prince Edwards Island just to say I had been there. That did not happen. As it was we were only in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. St. Johns, NB was old, dirty and depressed. The people were wonderful but the place was poor.

From Canada, our next stop was Nyack, New York, the old and historical Simpson Memorial Church and the headquarters of the Christian and Missionary Alliance. We had stepped into the history of the C&MA. The town also reeked with history – the home of actress Helen Hayes, the birthplace of the Alliance and the home of Nyack College where it all began.

We always had a primary comedy skit we did each year. We had stopped at a Bible quiz meet in PA where I believe I was the quizmaster. That camp had some terrific buildings. We did several skits including “The Gunfight” and got dressed for some great photos on the porch of an old building. The audience was loaded with C&MA big shots. The biggest surprise was how few spoke to me at the performance. I don’t know what I was expecting, but the silence was deafening.

The next day we left for Stoneybrook, New York. To get there we had to go through New York City. What a zoo. I knew some of my way around Manhattan so decided we could drive through to see some of the sights. Taking a van pulling a trailer in that city was crazy. The traffic was so heavy and at one point there was no way to get though a space without the drivers side mirror hitting another trucks mirror. Had to do it.

Stoneybrook was a very wealthy area and it looked to rich for our blood. The school where Bob Bell was principle was old, somewhat ivy covered and stuffy. We were to perform in the school auditorium. It may have seated 300-400. While they had stage lights, we had to set ours up because of the time it would take to readjust all they had and then put it back the way it was. Rather than controlling our lights and sound from the back of the auditorium we were running things from the side of the stage. Outlets and cord length were problems. As a result our controls were located about ten feet from the raft.

The evening began rather tense. It was clear the audience was primarily Jewish and they were tense about us being there. I was very concerned about the possible reaction, but we were here and we were going to perform. This was for Bob Bell.

The lights went down and the audience quieted. The music began, the lights came up slowly as the actors crawled up on the raft seeming to come out of the water. A few lines were spoken and suddenly there was the sound of air escaping and the raft settled with a thud on the stage. One of our two inner tubes supporting the raft sprung a leak. We had a flat in the most hostile situation for a performance we had ever faced.

All the actors turned and looked off stage at me with expressions that said, “What do we do now?”