FAYETTEVILLE -- TheatreSquared officials want to build a performance venue on a municipal parking lot, Martin Miller, executive director of the nonprofit theater company, said Friday.
The 54-space parking lot, southeast of Spring Street and West Avenue, is across the street from Nadine Baum Studios, TheatreSquared's home for the past 10 years. The lot has been used as a construction staging area for several months while the city's Spring Street parking deck is being built on the south end of the Walton Arts Center property.
At a Glance
TheatreSquared
• TheatreSquared opened its 10th season in August with “Amadeus,” a play by Peter Shaffer.
• The nonprofit, professional theater company performs in schools throughout the state.
• The organization reaches more than 33,000 patrons each year.
• In 2011, TheatreSquared was recognized by the American Theatre Wing, founder of the Tony Awards, as one of the nation’s 10 most promising emerging theaters.
Source: Theatre2.org
TheatreSquared formed a community task force in early 2015 to begin planning for the new performance center.
Miller said Friday the organization's 175-seat space in Nadine Baum Studios helped get the professional theater company up and running, but a bigger venue is needed.
TheatreSquared's administrative offices are off-site in the E.J. Ball Building, 112 W. Center St., and its scene shop is almost 3 miles away in a warehouse off Gregg Avenue.
"All of our staff working together on one of these shows is not actually working together," Miller said. "We are separate. And that is inefficient, and it also is not a perfect artistic model."
The location across West Avenue from Nadine Baum Studios will allow the theater company to retain all of the perks of being in the city's downtown entertainment district -- just in a larger space, he said.
"The idea of people being able to park, to have dinner, to have a drink, to watch the show, to stay and have another drink and talk about the show right in the same area ... that is really what we want to be part of," Miller said. "We love the idea of being part of a new theater district in downtown Fayetteville -- our region's theater district. And with the completed renovations of the Walton Arts Center, along with this completed project, I think there will be no doubt in anyone's mind where the sort of beating heart of theater lives for this part of the country."
TheatreSquared officials envision a 51,500-square-foot building, whereas Nadine Baum Studios is about 20,000 square feet, according to Washington County property records. The building also houses art studios for the Community Creative Center.
Even with a larger venue, TheatreSquared wants to offer a personal experience.
"What is brilliant about our current space is its intimacy, and that is always going to be at the core of how we present our work: literal proximity to great artists making great work," Miller said.
Plans for the new theater got a major financial boost earlier this week when the Walton Family Foundation announced TheatreSquared is one of three recipients of the foundation's Northwest Arkansas Design Excellence Program.
A foundation grant will pay for architectural work for the new facility.
TheatreSquared and Fayetteville were also awarded a separate $100,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts this summer. That grant will allow officials to explore the theater company's "long-term role as an arts-based contributor to the downtown entertainment district," according to a July 15 news release.
Miller said Friday he hopes to present the first play in the new building in 2019.
In order for the design process to begin, however, TheatreSquared representatives need assurance from Fayetteville officials they'll be able to build on the city parking lot.
City Council members are scheduled to consider a resolution Oct. 6 expressing their intent to sell or lease the 0.8-acre tract to TheatreSquared. The resolution doesn't detail terms of the lease or sale. Those terms will have to be negotiated.
Mayor Lioneld Jordan's administration intends to bring a negotiated agreement back to aldermen for approval in spring 2016, according to a memo from Jeremy Pate, Development Services director.
"Staff fully supports this endeavor, as we believe the impact of an expanded, unique professional theater in the downtown can be a significant draw for tourism and economic development," Pate said in the memo. "In combination with the Walton Arts Center expansion and the amenities that downtown Fayetteville has to offer, this facility, if fully realized, will add to the Northwest Arkansas region's arsenal of cultural amenities, thereby fueling tourism and spending in our economies."
Nadine Baum Studios, like the Walton Arts Center property, is jointly owned by the city and University of Arkansas and operated by the Walton Arts Center Council.
TheatreSquared rents its space in Nadine Baum Studios from the Walton Arts Center.
It's unclear what will become of the space if the organization moves to a new facility across the street.
Erin Rogers, spokeswoman for the Walton Arts Center, declined to speculate on how the space might be used.
"We're thrilled to see the success of TheatreSquared, and we look forward to a continued partnership," Rogers said.
Miller said it's too early in the process to discuss how TheatreSquared intends to pay for construction of the new facility.
"We've had some very promising conversations, but I don't have more to share yet," he said, adding, "We'll certainly look to all possibilities."
NW News on 09/26/2015