Marta Becket, at 92; dancer, artist brought ballet to deserted hall
near Death Valley . Associated Press . LAS VEGAS - Marta Becket, a
dancer and artist who spent decades presenting one-woman shows at a
remote Mojave Desert hall that she made famous as the Amargosa Opera
House, died Jan. 30 at her home in Death Valley Junction, Calif. She
was 92. A New York City native, she had performed on Broadway and at
Radio City Music Hall. A flat tire during a 1967 camping trip with her
husband to Death Valley, changed her life. They discovered an abandoned
theater in a mining town. The couple rented the building, and Marta
Becket made her debut in 1968 at the renamed Amargosa Opera House. In
the beginning, only the three Mormon families who lived in the town at
that time came to watch. The nearest town is 23 miles away from the
opera house, but audiences filled its 114 theater seats so many times
over the years that extra chairs sometimes had to be brought in. Ms.
Becket wrote songs and dialogue, sewed costumes, and painted sets. She
danced every Monday, Friday, and Saturday whether the house was full or
empty. She spent six years drawing and painted imaginary fans on the
opera house's walls and painted the ceiling with a blue sky, dancing
cherubs, clouds, and doves. "I love dance. I love ballet. It's the
world I want," she said in 2001. "It's mystifying. I feel as if this is
what I was intended to do. Her husband left in 1983, leaving Ms. Becket
and her longtime friend, emcee, stagehand, stage manager, and silent
sidekick Tom Willett as the town's only residents. Willett died in
2005. Ms. Becket continued to dance well into her 80s, although health
problems slowed her in later years. She gave a final performance in
February 2012, before turning the theater over to a nonprofit group.
Her story was captured in 2000 in the award-winning documentary
"Amargosa.
