Photo: Joshua Giant
by Steve Desroches
On a steamy Monday night in July Commercial Street is packed and in full summer swing. People bounce around in a frenetic pattern like electrons dancing around an atom accompanied by a soundtrack of noise similar to a pinball machine. But rising among the din of the height of the season in Provincetown is a voice belting out a song that stops one in their tracks. Where is this voice coming from and whose is it? In a town bursting at the seams with talent it is difficult to make a name for oneself, never mind become the “it” person of the crowded summer scene. But that’s exactly what actor and singer Brittany Rolfs is doing as she takes the town by storm with her Broadway belter voice and commanding stage presence. And that voice that night was Rolfs as she was co-hosting Broadway on the Beach at the Crown & Anchor. Her name is garnering buzz that cannot be bought and attention that is only received from delivering excellence.
Coming off a standout performance in the smash hit comedy musical Reefer Madness at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater (WHAT), in which she frequently stole the show, Rolfs and company did what was often seen as the impossible—getting “Provincetown people” to travel down Route 6 to see a show in that town on the other side of Truro. A Massachusetts native, Rolfs moved here from the Bronx several years ago, initially landing on Cape Cod in Harwich, where her friend Jane Staab, founder of the Wheelock Family Theatre lives and works with the Harwich Junior Theatre. Rolfs was done with New York City, but Harwich proved to be a little too sleepy, and she soon hit the road to Provincetown looking for a bit of adventure.
“Before I had only heard about it as a place to retire,” says Rolfs. “I had no idea that there were all these people here doing what they were doing. It is a community. I guess I would call it a scene. There are so many people here doing great work. It’s exciting to be part of it.”
From a very young age Rolfs felt drawn to the stage. She clearly had star quality landing roles in school plays and local theaters. By 10 years old she’d begun to receive attention for her voice, which in depth, range, and volume had the gravitas that is expected from a performer with more age and experience. She remembers her “tough Boston broad” of a grandmother saying to her, “You’re always going to be the best in the room, but that’s nothing to get a big head about.” That being said, one day when she went to see her grandmother at work she saw that she had framed and hung on the wall for all to see clippings from every time Rolfs’ name was in a newspaper for a show she was in.
The theater was clearly where Rolfs belonged, and finding that kind of home was extra important as she grew up in the foster care system, aging out when she was 18. She lived most of her childhood out of a suitcase going from foster home to foster home, with theater and her love of performance being a constant in a world that, for her, was filled with uncertainty and instability. Her love of theater brought her to New York when she was still only 17, still receiving child support as she “couch surfed” trying to make it as an actor and being close to Broadway, which is her biggest love of all.
“Theater was a way for me to be seen, to let everyone know I was here, that I existed,” says Rolfs. “It’s how I was literally and figuratively seen in the world. Actually I would often find my next foster home from someone who saw me in a show and offered to take me in.”
The grind of shifting back and forth between New York City and Boston began to wear on her, especially in Manhattan where the creative scene is being squashed by big money and casting agents are often looking for carbon-copies guaranteed to sell tickets rather than invest in original and unique talent. To scale, it is much smaller, but what Rolfs was largely looking for is here in Provincetown. True, performing for tourists in a tourist town can be fraught with drunken audience members and the occasional entitled queen. But what’s clear is that Provincetown, all of its parts, loves what Rolfs is doing. And now she finds herself performing alongside Broadway performers as well as drawing standing-room-only crowds at the piano bars at the Crown and the Gifford House. And she was crowned the Bearded Mistress at last year’s Miss Bearded Mistress Pageant, a contest where everyone must have a beard, regardless of gender, at the Provincetown Brewing Company, earning some drag street cred along the way. It’s all happening for her right now.
“I’m at a bit of a crossroads now,” says Rolfs. “I’ll have some savings come the end of the summer and want to see what’s out there, to see what opportunities are out there. But I’m completely intoxicated by Provincetown. I always want to be here, to be a part of here. I want to be here.”
Brittany Rolfs performs Thursdays starting at 9:30 p.m. throughout the summer with Clint Morris on piano at the Dive Bar at the Crown & Anchor, 247 Commercial St. There is no cover. She also co-hosts Broadway on the Beach with Marissa Miller at the Crown Mondays at 7:30 p.m. now through September 16. Tickets ($35/$45) are available at the box office and online at onlyatthecrown.com. For more information call 508.487.1430. Rolfs and Morris perform at the Gifford House, 9 Carver St., Tuesdays starting at 10 p.m. There is no cover. For more information call 508.487.0688 or visit giffordsprovincetown.com. Rolfs also hosts Fag Out Fridays at the Provincetown Brewing Company, 141 Bradford St., Fridays at 7 p.m. Rolfs will also appear at the Miss Bearded Mistress Pageant, Monday, August 5 at 8 p.m. For tickets to the pageant ($30/$100) or more information call 508.413.9076 or visit ptownbrewingco.com.
