Ralph Miller, the former owner of the Woodstock Playhouse whose string of summer stock properties have had a history of going up in flames over the years, was sentenced Monday in Philadelphia federal court to 30 months in prison in connection with fraudulent insurance claims relating to two historic Pennsylvania playhouses that were destroyed or damaged by fire and flood.
According to the Pocono Record, U.S. District Court Judge Cynthia M. Rufe characterized Miller as a charlatan and snake oil salesman. In addition to his prison sentence, Rufe ordered a three-year term of supervised release along with a year of home confinement with electronic monitoring. In addition, he was ordered to pay $240,000 in restitution to the Federal Emergency Management Agency on charges related to a flood at the Bucks County Playhouse.
The historic Woodstock Playhouse burned to the ground on Memorial Day, 1988. And while fire officials at that time deemed it a case of arson, Miller was never charged in connection with that fire. Another of his properties, the Falmouth Playhouse in Massachusetts, was torched in 1994. Again, arson was assessed but charges were never filed. Miller has always denied any responsibility for either fire.
Miller, who is 69, faced a possible 30 years in prison on the Pennsylvania charges.
His sentencing comes in the wake of his conviction in May on mail fraud and money laundering charges in connection with a fire that destroyed the Pocono Playhouse in 2009 and fraudulent insurance claims resulting from a flood that damaged the Bucks County Playhouse in 2006.
The Woodstock Playhouse’s demise in the wake of the 1988 fire was for many years a sad and seemingly symbolic event in the town’s history; the playhouse was both the physical and emotional gateway to a community that had been established to nurture the arts. It had been one of the first theaters in the country to offer summer stock performances. Then, in the dead of night on a Memorial Day, 60 years after it opened, fire left that gateway a smoldering pile of ash.
The fire came at a time when Woodstock sometimes seemed to be under siege from developers and commercial interlopers eager to cash in on, rather than contribute to, the community’s reputation.
Though Miller never was charged with any crime in connection with the playhouse fire, it was the rare Woodstocker who believed in his innocence, especially after reports of suspicious fires at other Miller-owned playhouses became known over the years.
Woodstock Times Editor Brian Hollander was town supervisor at the time of the fire. He lived two blocks from the playhouse: “I’ll never forget that day…pre-dawn, the air smelling like a battlefield, a beloved icon of Woodstock gone like a pile of dried matchsticks. Sure it was old and had the quirks of a creaky old barn, but its walls, curtains and seats had witnessed greatness, from the ridiculous to the sublime…No charges were ever filed, even though it was called arson. If it was him, maybe he’ll think about it every day for next 30 months . . .”
Though it took more than a decade, the Woodstock Playhouse finally rose from the ashes five years ago, when the not-for-profit Pan American Dance Foundation Inc. became the new owner. The re-built playhouse has since become a year-round venue for theater, film and dance productions.
Randy Conti, executive director of the Playhouse, said he was glad to see that “justice was served for what he (Miller) was convicted of.”
“We’re just very pleased the Playhouse is up and running and back to where it should be, creating opportunities…The past is the past. It’s a shame what happened, but we’re looking at what’s possible in the future.”
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