The state smoking ban has cast the future of the Phoenix Theatre and the Next Stage Theatre Company in doubt.
Theatre Group artistic director Steven Tangedal has put his Phoenix Theater at 1124 Santa Fe Drive up for sale. The company has depended for years on about $80,000 in annual revenues from running weekly games at Bingo City.
“But in the six months since the smoking ban went into effect, we’ve only earned about $10,000,” said Tangedal. “That’s a 75 percent drop.”
He pays a $2,000 monthly mortgage on the Phoenix and rents Theatre On Broadway (13 S. Broadway) from Loveland’s Jeff Peterson for $5,000 a month.
Theatre Group performs at TOB and rents the Phoenix to groups such as Paragon and Next Stage, “but we’re not interested in being a landlord anymore,” Tangedal said. Paragon and Next Stage get first crack at buying the Phoenix, he said, but with an asking price near $500,000, that seems unlikely.
Paragon co-founder Michael Stricker said his company is “greatly considering” purchasing the Phoenix, which Tangedal bought for $200,000. But if neither Paragon nor Next Stage can make it work, Tangedal said, the building will be sold to the highest bidder, and likely demolished. A possible suitor might be next-door neighbor Semple Brown Design. Ironically, SBD rehabs theaters, but, in this case it would be claiming one.
Tangedal said that any buyer would have to honor all 2007 scheduled Paragon and Next Stage performances before taking further action.
Next Stage artistic director Gene Kato, who previously scuttled “A Man of No Importance” because of the ban, also has scotched “Match.” “The smoking ban is a big issue with this show,” said Kato, and I try to hold myself to a little higher standard than to try to fudge something through.”
He’s replaced “Match” with “Frame 312,” about a housewife who for 30 years secretly possessed the original Zapruder film of JFK’s assassination.
But Kato makes no bones that losing the Phoenix may spell an end to his company. “Next Stage may yet still live on, but it’s up to the fates,” he said. “Until then, we will fight to stay alive.”
This week’s theater openings
WED.-DEC. 31 | National touring production of “All Shook Up” (at the Buell)
WED.-DEC. 30 | Lake Dillon’s “One-Man Scrooge” | DILLON
THU-DEC. 24 | Backstage’s “Christmas Trunk” and “Elf’s Tale” | BRECKENRIDGE
This week’s theater closings
TODAY | National touring production of “Sweet Charity” (at the Buell)
TODAY | Score’s “Urinetown” (at the Denver Wastewater Management Building)
TODAY | Aurora Fox’s “Escanaba in da Moonlight”
TODAY | TheatreWorks’ “Arms and the Man” | COLORADO SPRINGS
TODAY | Arvada Center’s “Sister’s Christmas Catechism” (at Black Box Theatre)
TODAY | El Centro Su Teatro’s “The Miracle at Tepeyac” (at King Center, Auraria)
TODAY | Lake Dillon’s “Always … Patsy Cline” | DILLON
TODAY | StageDoor’s “A Christmas Carol” | ASPEN
WED | Dan Mundell’s “High Plains Holiday” (Mon.-Wed., Playwright Theatre)
SAT | Denver Center Theatre Company’s “Season’s Greetings”
SAT | Buntport’s “Winter in Graupel Bay”
SAT | Miners Alley Playhouse’s “Amahl & the Night Visitors” | GOLDEN
SAT | Rattlebrain’s “B.F.E.: The Town Christmas Forgot” (at Avenue Theater)
SAT | Victorian Playhouse’s “Mrs. Bob Cratchit’s Wild Christmas Binge”
SAT | Iron Springs Chateau’s “2006 Holiday Extravaganza” | MANITOU SPRINGS
DEC. 24 | Denver Center Theatre Company’s “A Christmas Carol”
DEC. 24 | The Bug Theatre Presents Gary Culig in “The Santaland Diaries”
