What spirits, legends await you in the Historic Cocoa Village Playhouse?
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A ghost? In a theater? You don’t say?!?
Legends of spirits lingering in theaters across the county have existed about as long as the theaters themselves.
The Historic Cocoa Village Playhouse is no exception, being home to possibly three spirits over the years, or so the stories go.
Built in 1924 as the Aladdin Theater, the landmark location on Brevard Avenue was the first such establishment to show “Talkies” when motion pictures were still in their infancy. It later became home to a vaudeville house.
After going through a series of owners as a film house, it became the State Theater sometime in the 1960s, according to Cocoa Village Playhouse executive director Anastacia Hawkins-Smith.
Theaters are often considered haunted because of the energy left from audience after audience seeing show after show, she said. However, her experiences in the building, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, have been more than echoes of past applause.
It's been a while since Hawkins-Smith has spoken publicly about the spirits, and she's still guarded when discussing them. She appreciates any interest in the theater, but she doesn't want to actually scare people away from its shows or programming.
She knows the playhouse's supernatural residents as three specific haunts, for lack of a better term.
The legend of Daniel
Hawkins-Smith says the historic building sits atop an Artesian well in a space, as the legend has it, occupied by a livery stable during the horse and buggy days of early Cocoa Village.
As the story goes, the site was perfect for the livery, providing fresh water for the horses. But sinister activity led to the spilling of innocent blood there. This story has been passed down through the years although no one has historical evidence to state it as fact.
Daniel was a stable boy for the livery, tending to the care of the animals, Hawkins-Smith says.
“Daniel was accused of stealing horses, and he was hung in the livery for that crime,” Hawkins-Smith says. Daniel was later proven innocent, as the horses were being taken by smugglers to work the cattle ranches in north and central Florida.
“The legend has it that the tears of Daniel ran down into the well, turning the water salty and unfit for the horses, and you can still see the streaks from his tears on the grounds today.”
Of course, Hawkins-Smith agrees, the salted well water is more likely due to the site’s proximity to the brackish waters of the Indian River Lagoon, but are the wet streaks linked to a ghostly presence? Well, that’s for you to decide.
The malevolent spirit
Hawkins-Smith also shared stories of a less-than-pleasant spirit in the building during the early 1990s. The spirit presented a heaviness and an uneasy feeling, the kind that makes your skin crawl.
“I always leave my keys in my office door so I don’t lose them. One night I was working late at the theater, and the keys began to shake and jingle in the door. I was alone in the building, and there was no one else anywhere around, and the keys just started rattling,” she says. “And it was at that point I said, 'This isn’t OK.' Out loud. 'This isn’t OK.'”
Hawkins-Smith says she then heard voices in the building as if people were coming up the stairs, but upon investigation, again, the building was empty.
She called her husband, Brian, reported the activity and quickly left for the night.
But it didn’t end there.
Chairs would move. Shadows would cross rooms. And noises in the auditorium itself grew louder and more frequent.
“The old seats in the theater were such that they slid forward, and when you got out of the seats they would clap back into an upright position. There were nights when you could hear the seats sliding and clapping back without anyone near them,” Hawkins-Smith says.
Frustrated and unnerved, Hawkins-Smith called upon her Christian faith, anointed the building with oil and told the spirit it was time to go.
“It was like a wind blew through the auditorium,” Hawkins-Smith says. “We haven’t had that kind of activity since.”
Joe the caretaker
Hawkins-Smith’s favorite spirit to chat about is that of a former projectionist.
Joe, whom Hawkins-Smith says she’s seen in shadow in the building, has become somewhat of a caretaker for her and the theater in general. His preferred area is in the balcony and the area where the projection room of the theater once stood, the area now home to the community theater’s spotlights.
“I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve had people tell me that they were walking up the steps to the top of the balcony and say ‘It felt like someone put their hand on my shoulder’,” she says. “I always respond, ‘Oh, that’s just Joe checking out who is in his building.'”
In 1993, FLORIDA TODAY columnist Billy Cox wrote about Joe:
"Physically, he was huge, 6-foot-2 or bigger with wild hair. His personal hygiene was a little suspect, as he was often preceded by the pungent aroma of sulfur or pickup-game armpits or maybe burned electrical wiring."
Hawkins-Smith said doors have opened and closed on their own. Chairs have moved. But more than anything else, Joe likes to leave a light on for Hawkins-Smith to remind her that he’s there.
“One night, I was leaving and I went to our lighting room behind the stage and turned off lights on the upper levels and specifically turned off Joe’s light. When I got to my car, I realized I didn’t have my keys,” she says with a knowing smile about the reaction she was about to get. “I turned to go back to the building and Joe’s light was on.”
Hawkins-Smith says she called an employee to let her back in the building and they began searching for her keys.
She discovered them in the light room door. The door she unlocked to specifically turn off the light Joe turned on.
“I like to think it was his way of saying ‘Hey, I’m still here and you left your keys behind’,” Hawkins-Smith says.
Rob Landers is a veteran multimedia journalist for the USA Today Network of Florida. Contact Landers at 321-242-3627 or rlanders@gannett.com. Twitter: @ByRobLanders
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Peter Pan
Want a chance for a rendezvous with Joe the Caretaker at Cocoa Village Playhouse? Your next opportunity will begin Nov. 18 when the theater presents the Peter Pan. Remember Joe likes to hang out in the balcony. Get your tickets today at cocoavillageplayhouse.com
Ghosts at other theaters
All theaters have ghosts, said Bryan Bergeron, executive director of Surfside Playhouse in Cocoa Beach. Here are a few of the legends at other Space Coast theaters.
1. Henegar Center for the Arts: The resident ghost Jonathan is known to hang out in the electrical loft to the left of the stage. He's been known to move props and hide things. He's also been spotted by cast members watching rehearsals from the balcony.
2. Melbourne Civic Theatre: Executive director Peg Girard says "George" has been known to go into the theater's tech booth and turn nobs on the sound board and interfere with the computers. He'll turn on the radio and can be seen walking up and down the stairs in the theater. He recently "turned on the fog machine before a performance of Murder on the Orient Express."
3. Titusville Playhouse: Actors have been grabbed by a mysterious presence near the dressing rooms. A little girl has been spotted waving from a window that is bricked off from the inside. Odd electrical glitches will happen during performances with the lighting system.
4. Surfside Playhouse: Bergeron from the Cocoa Beach theater says that various performers and patrons have seen apparitions, but no loud noises or mischief to report.
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Ghosts haunted spirits Cocoa Village Playhouse Joe Caretaker Halloween
