Sidney Bruhl hasn’t written a hit play in decades and now he is desperate -just how desperate becomes apparent when a young protege brings just that to his home.
Masterfully-written suspense, labyrinthian plot twists, and conniving characters come together to make Ira Levin’s thrilling comedy “Deathtrap” one of the biggest hits in the history of Broadway. The five roles in the Fall offering from Belfast Maskers will be cast this month.

An initial reading of the play will be held on Wednesday, August 25  at 6:30 P.M. in the theater at 43 Front Street. These read-throughs are casual and open to anyone, but are especially valuable to people that want to audition for “Deathtrap” that Saturday morning, 10 A.M.
All the parts are open, and will be cast following the August 28 auditions.
The two leads are:
Sidney Bruhl, a playwright who desperately needs a hit,  male, to play 50 plus.
Clifford Anderson, a playwright who has written a “sure thing”, a man, to play 25-35.
Supporting roles are:
Myra Bruhl, somewhat controlled-by and married-to Sidney, to play 30-40.
Helga Ten Dorp, a Dutch woman with ESP (she has an accent: Dutch or modified German would work), to play over 50.
Porter Milgrim, Sidney’s agent, to play over 45.
“Deathtrap” takes place in  he home of Sidney Bruhl in Westport, CT – the “gold coast” of Fairfield county. The time is 1978.
Belfast Maskers auditions are cold readings from the script, but director Bart Shattuck would also welcome any short monologues an actor may have prepared.

Shattuck brings to “Deathtrap” his years of experience in NYC writing, directing, and performing theater and comedy. He toured with the National Shakespeare Company, performed  with American Players Theater in Wisconsin, the Mill Mountain Theater in Virginia. After a stint doing work on films in Los Angeles, Bart made his way toward Maine, directing and teaching sketch and improvisational comedy along the way in L.A., Connecticut, New York, and Mass. Since moving to the Waterville area with his wife Jeralyn a couple years ago, he’s acted in over a dozen shows with the Gaslight and Lakewood theater companies. bartshattuck.com

“Deathtrap”, a Thriller in Two Acts, opens Thursday, September 30 at 7 P.M. with a special preview night price of just $8. The run continues Thursdays through Saturdays, with Sunday matinees at 2 P.M. until October 10. Tickets for the regular run are $15, $10 for teens, and available at the theater one hour before shows; by calling the box office: (207)338-9668; or at Yo Mamma’s Home, 96 Main Street. Belfast Maskers is a 501(c)3 Non-profit community theater. More information can be found at belfastmaskers.com.

The Belfast Maskers Summer internship program was started by artistic director Aynne Ames in 2006 after she’d decided to mount an ambitious production of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” with a large cast, music, songs, and dancing. Outside. She had seen Steamboat Landing Park and thought it was the ideal venue for the much-needed expansion of Belfast Maskers productions. Undaunted by the multitude of people convinced it would be a debacle, Ames plowed ahead with her plans to realize her dream of live theater by Belfast’s beautiful bay. She knew she would need help and knew where she could find it. Ames drew from her many connections throughout the theater community in Maine, New England, and beyond to bring in four interns to complement her ensemble cast -as well as perform technical work. Interns painted, constructed and dressed sets, assisted with lighting and sound design, then performed alongside local talent as some of the principal roles in the show. The production was a spectacular success, as was the next year’s “Carousel” for which she again brought in interns. The following year she expanded the program to include some mostly technical internships, continuing this year.

A Belfast Maskers internship is a symbiotic relationship, as the students and recent graduates bring the benefit of their recent training, education, and experiences to share with the community theater and take away work experience in a practical, supervised theater setting -not to mention a summer spent in beautiful, coastal Maine. In Aynne’s assessment, the program “…allows young pre professional actors to stretch their wings in a new location with different directors than the ones they have been working with in college. It also flushes out their resumés with major roles they are unlikely to have played in college. It gives our local Maskers, who cannot go “there” to work with others, a chance to work with other like folk by bringing  those folks here to Belfast and everyone gets better when the bar is raised higher. Each time a production is seen as of professional quality , it draws more and more people both as audience and volunteers and that is better for everyone.”

Interns are given a stipend for living expenses; local Maskers volunteers and supporters provide a place to live for out-of-towners.
Interns have come from Belfast, other parts of Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Washington, D.C., and as far away as Ireland. This year’s interns began arriving from a variety of locations in mid-June, ready to dive right into the work required to present the first play on Belfast Maskers new Festival Stage, William Inge’s “Picnic”. They joined a cast and crew of local volunteers, both seasoned Belfast Maskers performers and relative newcomers, to make the Pulitzer Prize-winning American play a hit. Ames added, “As talented and generous as our local folks are, they still have to hold jobs in the summer, and they have family responsibilities. Yet, putting up (now) two shows in this kind of time period requires that we have some folks who can be dedicated to only the theater –both tech and performance, and all interns do both.”

Belfast Maskers was disappointed to hear of the closing of The Fertile Mind Booksellers in Belfast. For many years, among the other large contributions they made to the community, they sold tickets for our shows. We are, however, pleased to announce that Yo Mamma’s Home, 96 Main St., Belfast, ME will be taking over that duty for us.

Yo Mamma’s Home offers a whimsical, eclectic, and sometimes downright irreverent collection of items for sale. Stationery, house wares, jewelry, cosmetics, and much more. They also offer cleaning, light repair, and other handyperson services.

Tickets are also available at the Waterfront Theater, 43 Front Street, one hour prior to the night’s performance, or with a major credit card at (207)338-9668

To be completed and installed in Steamboat Landing Park by June of this year, the Belfast Maskers Festival stage will be the venue for our two outdoor summer shows, “Picnic” and “Cinderella”.

Designer and Master Carpenter John Bielenberg said the design is inspired by the permanent, architectural, indoor festival stages of Shakespeare Festivals, such as that of Stratford, Ontario. There will be several levels, allowing multiple entrances and exits in all directions. The vertical constructs in the back provide a firm base for any number of scenery and set elements to be attached. Mr. Bielenberg will perform the construction himself with the help of volunteers.

Funding for the stage was made possible by grants from the Davis Family Foundation and the Hut Foundation. The stage will also be made available for other groups to use during the Summer, with approval from the Belfast City Council.