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Marta Becket, at 92; dancer, artist brought ballet to deserted hall near Death Valley
Ms. Becket danced for 44 years in an abandoned theater she transformed into the Amargosa Opera House in the Mojave Desert. It took her six years to paint the mural of fans along the sides and back of the opera house. ( photos by The Las Vegas Sun via AP File/2005)
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.’’