9-7-08
Bailiwick Abandons Permanent Home
For 15 years, Bailiwick Repertory Theatre has been plugging the holes, patching up its building, staying just one step ahead of code, or the rain, or the rent. Now, Bailiwick is walking away from their space at 1229 W. Belmont. But, says artistic director David Zak, they’re not going to stop producing. They’ll just be itinerant for a while. Or be resident in another space.
“I would love to be able to have a nice theatre for once in my life,” said Zak from his office on Saturday. (For the last three months, Bailiwick has been shedding staff, and Zak is the only full-timer left.) He said he would like to stage the Pride Series at The Center on Halsted, where About Face now performs. And, he said that he’s been looking for theatres for the last six months and has some “interesting opportunities.”
Meanwhile, Jeremy Wechsler, who chronicled some of his search and planning for a new theatre space in PerformInk’s Space Odyssey column, has finally gotten his dream space at 1229. His 10-year lease starts November 1, but will rent it out to Bailiwick till the end of the year. He’ll then gut the place and rebuild it, making three theatres in the vicinity of 99 seats.
“Producing organizations really need 99-seat performance spaces,” Wechsler said. “There are a ton of theatres that are really ready to grow and they can’t.”
Wechsler’s plan isn’t just to rent out spaces. He wants three or four theatres to be in residence, make 1229 their permanent home. He is talking with Stage Left, but he says he hasn’t been focusing on courting other theatres. His focus for the last six weeks has been on getting the lease done and making plans for the build-out.
Wechsler said the landlords, Spiros and Kiki Stamelos, contacted him and offered the space. The Stamelos’ own the rehearsal space Theater Wit had been renting. Within weeks they had come to an agreement and signed the lease.
Bailiwick will produce its Pride Series in September, then end the year with a revival of A Christmas Schooner. Hell in a Handbag will continue to produce in Bailiwick’s studio until their lease runs out at the end of the year.
Then Wechsler will take all the drywall down and start from scratch. He will install new HVAC, and the Stamelos’ have agreed to bring in more electrical circuits to accommodate three theatres. The new Theater Wit space will have a central box office, much like its next store neighbor, Theatre Building Chicago. Wechsler said he hopes to start demolition in January and be up and running by June. He estimates that the entire build-out will cost around $500,000.
Zak, for his part, is relieved to not have to support a building. He vows that Bailiwick, which has been producing since 1982, will go one, perhaps renting space depending on the show. Bailiwick has been getting critical and Jeff Award recognition the past couple of years for its big musicals, like Kiss of the Spiderwoman, Jerry Springer – The Opera, and the current The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Zak hopes that in the future, he doesn’t have to cram a musical onto a small stage.
“If you want to do a big musical, get a big musical facility,” he said. “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out”