Robert Armin was Artistic Director of the Blairstown Theater Festival at historic Roy's Hall in Blairstown New Jersey where he presented classical, jazz and cabaret concerts featuring such artists as the Baroque Orchestra of North Jersey, the Western Wind Vocal Ensemble, the Still River Band, Cris Groenendaal, Nancy Anderson, Stuart Zagnit and others, along with a production of A Couple of Blaguards (co-written by and starring Malachy McCourt) and the New Jersey premieres of I Am Anne Frank and his own play, Letters From The Inside, based on the novel by Australian writer John Marsden, which was nominated by the Newark Star-Ledger as one of the five best new plays presented in New Jersey during the 2006-2007 season.

In November 2007, he directed the Worthington Players in a production of James Thurber and Elliott Nugent's hit 1940 comedy, The Male Animal, at the Shawnee Playhouse in Eastern Pennsylvania.

He collaborated with novelist Budd Schulberg and composer lyricist Ervin Drake on a revised version of their 1964 musical, What Makes Sammy Run?, reatment Center at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital for his ground-breaking work as the first male in the Hospital's rape crisis vonit and others, along with a production of A Couple of Blaguards (co-written by and starring Malachy McCourt) and the New Jersey premieres of I Am Anne Frank and his own play, Letters From The Inside, based on the novel by Australian writer John Marsden, which was nominated by the Newark Star-Ledger as one of the five best new plays presented in New Jersey during the 2006-2007 season.

He collaborated with novelist Budd Schulberg and composer lyricist Ervin Drake on a revised version of their 1964 musical, What Makes Sammy Run?, which played to sold-out houses in January of 2006, and he wrote and directed the New York City production of Stalking The Nightmare, a stage adaptation of several short stories by fantasist Harlan Ellison.

In May of 2002, he directed a staged reading of his "new" Vernon Duke musical, Madly in Love, at The York Theatre Company, and in June directed The Broadway Musicals of 1964 at New York City's Town Hall. He also conceived and directed the world premiere of Side By Side By Seymour Glick, a musical revue featuring the comedy songs of Steve Allen, and the acclaimed 1996 New York City revival of Say, Darling, the 1958 comedy with songs by Betty Comden, Adolph Green and Jule Styne. Other New York City directing credits include revivals of The Male Animal and My Sister Eileen and the world premieres of Soul Survivors, The Computerization of Byron Keats, Love Is Like That, A Magic Place in a New Time, A Mind is a Terrible Thing To Lose, and 'S Wonderful - The Songs of Ira Gershwin.

A former actor, his credits included productions of Sweet Charity (Oscar) , Come Blow Your Horn (Buddy), Accommodations (Tracy), The Knack (Tom), Never Too Late (Charlie) and the American Premiere of the musical, Gone With The Wind, along with brief appearances in the TV movies Dream House (with John Schneider and Marilu Henner) and Family Reunion (with Bette Davis).

In 2004, he was honored by the Women's Conference Committee of the Screen Actor's Guild and the Crime Victims Treatment Center at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital for his ground-breaking work as the first male in the Hospital's rape crisis volunteer advocate program. He is married to musical comedy performer, Kristine Nevins.

'Distinctive' defines Roy's Hall

Friday, September 14, 2007

By JACQUELINE LINDSAY
Staff Writer

BLAIRSTOWN -- When professional director and writer Robert Armin and his wife Kristine Nevins, who is a musical comedy performer, laid eyes on Roy's Hall for the first time last year they were immediately taken with the early 1900s historic theater. By mid-December the New York City couple had booked an impressive line up of shows and opened their doors to the public.

"I fell in love with it. It was exactly what we were looking," Armin said of Roy's Hall. "We fell in love with Blairstown. We love the community and we love the area. We wanted to bring artists out to this wonderful place to perform."

This weekend, 3 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 16, the "Inventions Trio" will make their New Jersey premier at Roy's Hall, which is located at 30 Main St. Popular Pianist Bill Mays is performing with new "Inventions Trio" group members, classically trained cellist Alisa Horn and trumpet player Marvin Stramm, who will perform fresh interpretations of well known classical themes, as well as original works.

On Saturday, Oct 6, theater goers will have a show stopping experience with a performance by Malachy McCourt in "Malachy Sez He." After a sold-out performance on St. Patrick's Day, McCourt -- actor, lecturer and raconteur -- is returning to Roy's Hall with his one-man show which is sure to have people "laughing out loud about life, politics and whatever pops into his head." There are two shows at 2:30 and 7:30 p.m.

On Nov. 3, Betsy Palmer will star in "Love Letters" -- a compelling two person play with a man and woman reading love letters. Palmer starred in the original "Friday the 13th" movie, which was shot 28 years ago in Blairstown and had a cameo of Roy's Theater. The doors will open at 7:30 p.m.

"It (Love Letters) has been performed all over the country by major actors," Armin said. "Virtually every actor has performed it somewhere."

Armin is a professional director and writer and former actor. During his career he collaborated with novelist Budd Schulberg and composer lyricist Ervin Drake on a revised version of their 1964 musical "What Makes Sammy Run?" and he wrote and directed the New York productions of "Letters From The Inside" based on the novel by Australian writer John Marsden, and "Stalking The Nightmare" a stage adaptation of several short stories by fantasist Harlan Ellison, as well as a myriad of other productions. In November he will be directing a production of James Thurber and Elliott Nugent's hit 1940 comedy "The Male Animal" at the Shawnee Playhouse.

Originally Blairstown's Main Street Livery, Roy's Hall was fashioned into a movie theater and community hall in 1913 by film exhibitors Robert Roy and Raymond Smith. The theater opened on April 2, 1913 with silent movies. It suffered a devastating fire Feb. 7, 1917 and was rebuilt and reopened July 14, 1917 and continued showing silent movies until 1930 when they converted to movies known as "talkies." Fierce competition from television closed the theater in 1961 and it would not be re-opened until 2002. The hall is known for its unique acoustics.

"You can sit in the back row and the sound engulfs you the sound is so pure," Armin said.

Armin admits the theater is a labor of love for the couple. Right now they are operating on a shoe string budget and hoping to break even, which is often challenging for a new theater. They plan to expand their line up of shows in the spring, but first need feedback from area residents on the shows they would like to see at the theater.

"We're doing this solely out of the love for the theater and the love for the performances. We need to have people come to see what we're up to. We can't make it happen without the enthusiastic response of the audience," Armin said. "A theater without an audience is like a tree falling in the woods with no one around. There's no one to hear the sound."

Tickets to the shows are $27.50 and can be purchased on-line at www.blairstowntheaterfestival.com or in person at local Blairstown stores -- Bebe's Books and Beans and Great Stuff from Jane's House.

They are also seeking volunteers to help before and during performances with stage production, building sets and props, technical lighting and sound, ushering, concessions, mailings and advertising. For more information, call (908) 362-1399.

Staff Writer Jacqueline Lindsay can be reached at (908) 852-5103 or jlindsay@njnpublishing.com.

Here's an article on our recent screening of FRIDAY THE 13TH

Jason comes to Blairstown in special 'Friday the 13th' screening

Friday, July 13, 2007

BY MIKE FRASSINELLI

Star-Ledger Staff

Today -- on Friday the 13th -- Jason lives!

More than a quarter-century after it premiered, the horror cult classic "Friday the 13th" will be shown tonight to moviegoers in the Warren County town where it was filmed.

When patrons at Roy's Hall theater in Blairstown see the slasher flick at 6:30 and again at 8:30, they will have the unique experience of watching it from a building seen in the 1980 film.

"It's not often you get to see a classic slasher film in the environment in which it was filmed," said Robert Armin, artistic director of the theater at 30 Main St. "It think it's a dream for a lot of people who have been waiting to see the film here in Blairstown. There was a sense of pride about the film at the time."

Northwestern New Jersey is all over the low-budget, high-grossing film that starred a young Kevin Bacon as a camp counselor and spawned a television show and 10 sequels.

The movie was about a summer camp called Camp Crystal Lake that reopened on a Friday the 13th in 1980, 23 years after negligent camp counselors apparently let a young boy named Jason Voorhees drown.

Angry that the camp was reopening, Jason's mother stabbed and axed the counselors before getting beheaded by the last remaining counselor. The killings were preceded by the spooky chants of "ki-ki-ki-ma-ma-ma!" -- short for "Kill, mommy!"

The reel-life Camp Crystal Lake is the real-life Camp NoBeBoSco (North Bergen Boy Scouts) in Hardwick Township, just north of Blairstown. Scenes also were shot at the Blairstown Water Works near Roy's Hall, and at Blairstown Diner and the Moravian Cemetery in Hope. A fuel truck from Stanhope drove past.

Warren County's chamber of commerce and public relations staff have since gotten calls from people across the country wanting to know how to get to "Camp Crystal Lake."

Seven of the film's sequels came after an installment titled "Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter," in which Jason -- by then a hockey-mask-wearing, chain-saw-toting adult -- was killed. He returned later in a version called "Jason Lives."

Festival showings at Roy's Hall in which the movies of the Marx Brothers, Abbott and Costello and Danny Kaye were shown failed to attract much attention, but Armin is reporting brisk sales for "Friday the 13th."

"As soon as we announced we were going to do it, people started getting very excited about it," said Armin, who credits North Warren News publisher and former Blairstown committeeman Gary Stevens with the idea to bring the film back to its roots.

Betsy Palmer, who starred as Pamela Voorhees, Jason's mom, had a prior commitment tonight. But the Broadway actress has agreed to return for a performance of "Love Letters" Nov. 3 at Roy's Hall, previously known as the Nous Theatre.

In an interview with The Star-Ledger to commemorate the 25th anniversary of "Friday the 13th," Palmer, a Broadway actress, said she never understood the popularity of the film until it struck her: "Everybody wants a mother who will kill for you and will die for you -- and I do both."

Scheduled to watch with filmgoers tonight is Ron Millkie, who played Officer Dorf.

Tickets are $10.

Mike Frassinelli may be reached at mfrassinelli@starledger.com or (908) 475-1218.

On June 10th, the Star-Ledger selected LETTERS FROM THE INSIDE as one of the TOP 5 new plays of the 2006-2007 New Jersey theater season and actress Kelli Ambrose, who played Mandy in the play, as one of the TOP 5 leading actresses in a play. Here are excerpts from the article and the two sets of nominations:

Will it ever happen? Will New Jersey ever premiere a musical that’s something wonderful? We get plenty of new homegrown, serious plays, and many amusing, freshly minted comedies, too. When it comes to song and dance, we stumble.

The best new plays of 2006-2007 reflected diversity. Two African-Americans were represented: “Radio Golf” by August Wilson and “The Brothers Size” by 26-year-old Tarell Alvin McCraney, a highly produced up-and-comer. Two women landed scripts on the list of five best plays as well.

Then came the painful new musicals. “Don’t Hug Me” at New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch; “Island” at 12 Miles West Theatre Company in Bloomfield; “Hot ’n Cole” at the Bickford Theatre in Morris Township — one worse than the other. We won’t even count “The Rat Pack Live at the Sands” because it was a glorified nightclub act. As for “The Kid From Brooklyn”: It was a rehash of last season’s “Danny (Kaye) and Sylvia (Fine),” with its star Brian Childers back again.

So the best “new” musicals were all Broadway hand-me-downs, the most recent of which is 5 years old. Still, these musty musicals are included in this list of the best that New Jersey stages had to offer this past season.

Best Play:
“The Brothers Size” by Tarell Alvin McCraney (Berlind Theatre, Princeton); “Letters From the Inside” by Robert Armin (Blairstown Theater Festival, Blairstown); “My Sister Underground” by Jewel Seehaus-Fisher (Women’s Theater Company, Parsippany); “October 1962” by D.W. Gregory (New Jersey Repertory Company, Long Branch); “Radio Golf” by August Wilson (McCarter Theatre Center, Princeton).
Winner: “Radio Golf.” Should upwardly mobile blacks forget where they came from and obliterate their landmarks? Wilson’s final play was a fitting conclusion to his 10-play cycle of 20th century African-American life.

Best Leading Play Actress:
Kelli Ambrose (“Letters From the Inside”); Mikaela Kafka (“The Maids,” Garage Theatre Group, Teaneck); Amanda Plummer (“Summer and Smoke”); Laila Robins (“The Cherry Orchard”); Jenny Vallancourt (“October 1962”).
Winner: Plummer. Alma Winemiller is usually played as a receding, let alone shrinking violet, but Plummer instead made her the smartest citizen in town, demanding respect from others. The risky approach worked beautifully, thanks to this gifted actress.

Below is the original review of LETTERS FROM THE INSIDE from the Star-Ledger, January 15, 2007.

Teen pen pals worth getting to know

Monday, January 15, 2007

BY PETER FILICHIA

Star-Ledger Staff

NEW JERSEY STAGE

The sensation that A.R. Gurney's "Love Letters" became in the '80s and '90s could -- and should -- be replicated by "Letters from the Inside."

Robert Armin, who's taken the Nous Theatre in Blairstown -- and renamed it the Blairstown Theatre Festival -- has staged a play he adapted from John Marsden's epistolary novel.

It's a must-see for teenagers, who should bring their parents with them, too.

As was the case in the more famous Gurney play, two performers speak aloud the letters that two people have written to each other. Here, though, instead of a man and a woman who have been lifelong friends, we have two teen girls who have never met.

The relationship starts when Mandy in Chicago decides to answer a pen-pal ad placed in a magazine by Tracey, who lives 10,000 miles away in Melbourne. Today, of course, they'd IM each other, but this story takes place more than a decade ago, when what we now sneeringly call "snail mail" had to do.

The show starts off innocently enough, with Mandy and Tracey putting to paper the smallest of small talk. Mandy reports that she just caught "How Green Was My Valley" on TV -- and stayed with it, even though it was in black-and-white. Tracey tells of her trips to Disneyland and Hawaii.

Mandy is impressed, especially because Tracey's letters suggest that her family is rather well-heeled. "Your life sounds great," Mandy writes. "Wanna swap?"

Then something telling occurs. Tracey says she must stop writing because her mother is calling her. The audience doesn't hear a mother's voice, but the sound of an institutional bell ringing.

Thus, we get suspicious long before Mandy does. Not until a much-later letter, when Tracey errs in saying that she's never been to America -- forgetting what she'd written about Disneyland and Hawaii -- does Mandy realize she's not reading the truth.

That truth turns out to be less surprising than an even bigger shock to come. Armin and Marsden remind us that adolescence, which was once merely an annoying time of life, has become far more complicated in today's ever-worsening world. The play is a solid reminder that inadvertent casualties could be prevented with more love and attention.

The long-haired and attractive Kelli Ambrose aptly makes Mandy speak too quickly, in the way that many teenage girls routinely do. When she's not overly excited, however, Ambrose offers a terrific vulnerability, even a China doll fragility. By the time she changes her complimentary close of "Luv ya" to a heartfelt "Love," the audience will be in love with her.

Gretchen Poulos is equally successful as Tracey. She starts off with a gritty smile and a nervous laugh, but eventually allows pain to invade her pretty face. Poulos' Down Under accent is excellent as well, though it's filtered through a weariness that lets us see that Tracey has many miles on her.

Her best moment comes when Mandy asks what's really going on. The way Poulos snarls, "You ask more bloody questions than a shrink" suggests that Tracey isn't just using that as a figure of speech. This girl has had quite a bit of experience with psychiatrists.

"Letters from the Inside" serves to remind us that theatrical power can occur on a set that's no more than two wooden blocks and two couches, by two actresses who never change clothes. It's a letter-perfect evening in the theater.

Here's an article from Skylands Magazine on the Blairstown Theater Festival: