In PB, businessman seeking to craft entertainment zone

Jack Stradley plans to fix up the Community Theater in downtown Pine Bluff and make it part of an entertainment district.
Jack Stradley plans to fix up the Community Theater in downtown Pine Bluff and make it part of an entertainment district.

— Retired Pine Bluff businessman Jack Stradley has a clear vision for a sliver of the city’s downtown.

It involves scrubbing and scraping away decades of blight to create an entertainment gem.

On a stretch of Second Avenue between Pine and Chestnut streets, just blocks from the Jefferson County Courthouse, Stradley hopes to transform a row of buildings that were part of a bustling cotton district during the late 19th and early 20th centuries into a restaurant, bar and even a museum.

Also under Stradley’s vision, two historic theaters in the area will be rejuvenated and feature professional grade shows and plays.

Stradley plans on calling the arts and entertainment district Cotton Row, an homage to the cotton brokers who once worked there.

Earlier this year, Stradley purchased the Community Theater, built in 1880 as a mercantile store, and three other buildings on Second Avenue.

As executive director of the nonprofit group Old Town Theatres Centre, Stradley has for the past several years also been involved in revitalizing the1924 Saenger Theater, which is owned by the city.

He said restoring both theaters, along with other buildings in the area, will “build a great momentum for downtown.”

The old theaters have “gotten into my blood,” he said.

Similar efforts to create arts districts are under way in other Arkansas cities.

In El Dorado, a $25 million renovation of the 1929 Rialto Theater is about to start. And under the umbrella of El Dorado Festivals & Events, the city is gearing up to become a “festival” city, according to officials there.

In Rogers, a historic opera house is being restored by a local resident, and the city’s Little Theatre is making a comeback, holding professional shows and attracting crowds.

In Pine Bluff, the projects are challenging.

Renovating the Saenger is a much tougher project than the Community Theater - and a more expensive one - requiring an estimated $25 million to complete, Stradley said.

For one, the Saenger is much larger than the Community, with 1,750 seats compared with the Community Theater’s 150.

The city is securing all the grant dollars it can for the Saenger project, “and we are relying on private donations,” Stradley said, noting that it will be “some time” before enough money is raised to restore the Saenger to its original luster.

There’s no timeline for opening a restored Saenger Theater, but it has been professionally protected to prevent physical deterioration, Stradley said.

Robert Tucker, Pine Bluff’s planning and zoning coordinator, is leading the Saenger renovation on the city’s end.

Renovations are just now beginning at the Community Theater, and Stradley said he hopes to hold productions there by midsummer of next year.

Stradley is spending his own money to renovate the Community and the buildings he purchased beside it.

He plans to pump around$150,000 into the theater before it opens.

The renovations will expand seating to 300. Stradley said as many as 100 shows could be held there annually.

The other projects - a restaurant, an antique doll museum and other attractions - will come later.

The Old Town Theatres Centre sponsors dinner theater shows at the Pine Bluff Country Club, and Stradley said that the shows could move to the Community once renovations are complete.

“That is our goal but, of course, these things are often fluid and can change,” Stradley said.

“We have a lot of work to do with renovations, but it’s exciting.”

Stradley said the dinner shows, held once a month featuring “the best of the best professional entertainers,” average around 100 guests at the country club.

Unlike some cities, such as Little Rock and its River Market District, the city of Pine Bluff isn’t involved in creating the planned arts district.

Instead, Old Town Theatres Centre board members, along with Stradley’s wife, Kathy Majewska, and a handful of others, are involved in the project.

Both in their mid-60s, the couple have a passion for the arts and said they want to pass that love along to Pine Bluff residents.

“The arts are so important to life,” Majewska said. “We just want to give Pine Bluff a taste of that. I feel like so many people here crave it.”

Arkansas, Pages 7 on 11/26/2012

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