BUCKFIELD — The message scrawled onto the plywood panel beneath the seating at the former Oddfellow Theater predicted a few things about the future: drolly, that another piece of plywood would cover it up; and that someone would land on Mars, which the the author would live to see if they didn’t first perish in a freak accident.

It did not predict what was obvious to anyone who sat in audience above the hidden note during the next 14 years: that the Oddfellow Theater would become a roaring, knee-slapping success. 

“We wanted a place where we could do whatever we wanted. I know there’ll be nothing like it again,” former owner Mike Miclon said. 

A month before the theater opened, Miclon was spending every waking minute pouring sweat equity into the staging when Jason Tardy, fellow juggler and one of the theater’s founding acts, evidently paused to write the note. Now, 17 years later, Miclon’s dismantling the remnants of the theater he built.

“It’s been slightly traumatic to tear this apart. When you build it, you think it’s going to last forever,” Miclon said. 

Oddfellow’s last show was in 2011. Miclon put the building on the market, but it never sold.

Such a place it holds in this small community’s mind that when he moved his family back after a brief hiatus, hopes of a revival sprung in the community.

When photos of the demolition hit Facebook, they drew crestfallen remembrances and nostalgia.

“I’ve got more but I don’t want to post them because this place always about joy,” Miclon said. 

Miclon was a performer traveling the U.S. and Europe on a duet called ‘Magic and Mayhem’ when the old Oddfellow Hall hit the market in 1996. Wanting to settle down and raise three sons with his wife Kim, he bid $20,000, almost twice the next offer.

Drawing on local talent and world-class acts, the small, 150-seat theater opened in 1998 and became a hot spot, selling out most shows.

Its audience was a hodge-podge of the community: from college students to grandmothers, toddlers and a solid contingent of recurring Buckfield faithful. Once, a trucker was introduced — “dragged,” Miclon recalled, laughing — to his first show, which happened to feature ballet. 

“He rearranged his route so he could come back every Saturday night from then on.”

 A late-night TV show spoof called ‘The Early Evening Show’ became its star attraction and still runs at the Celebration Barn in Paris and Johnson Hall in Gardiner.   

The theater featured acts that would go on to become famous. Grammy-winner Ray Lamontagne debuted here. Amanda Huotari brought peels of laughter from the audience and Jason and Matt Tardy juggled to prominence. Memories of Fritz Grobe, one half of the YouTube sensation, EepyBird (or “the Coke and Mentos guys”), can still be found on the soda-splashed ceiling.

“It was always a scramble,” Grobe recalled. “Backstage during the first act, I’d build staging for the second half. The skit? We’d practice that during intermission.”

Part Jerry Lewis, part vaudeville, writers would craft jokes until they rolled with laughter, dial it back a bit and — voila —  a script was born. 

“This was the lab we could try anything and everything. People came in here expecting the unexpected,” Miclon said.  

The Buckfield native’s not sure what it will become, but its days as a theater are over. Most of the seats, the lighting, the curtain and other equipment were sold to other theaters. He’ll flatten the floor, which flares up at a slow angle for good views from the back row. 

The stage, however, will stay. 

“It was perfection. We gained and never lost. I made lifelong friends. What happened on those boards was the greatest theater of my life.” 

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