Big changes coming for the off-Loop theater Stage 773: ‘Willy Wonka meets Burning Man’
Big changes are coming to Stage 773, a longtime anchor of the Belmont Avenue theater district in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood and, for decades, a source of affordable space for itinerant Chicago theater companies.
Tenants of the theater, including American Blues Theater, have been told that the facility, located at 1225 W. Belmont Ave., will no longer rent out its four theaters to resident companies and commercial producers. Instead, the building will be renovated and reconceived as a single-space entity.
The rationale? “The building is going to be completely re-imagined, re-invented and re-constructed to house a Willy Wonka meets Burning Man meets the Museum of Modern Art immersive experience,” said Jill Valentine, executive director of Stage 773.
“We are embracing a bold new theatrical world as we reconceive the relationship between artist and audience,” Valentine said. “We dreamt of creating a venue like no other in Chicago, one that would become an immersive art playground — part theatrical performance, part an artistic experience, part lighting and media installation, and part experiential wild rollercoaster — one that could be considered a national destination.”
Plans call for the new ticketed, self-guided endeavor, which Valentine said would employ human actors along with extensive technology, to open in November.
“By creating moments that weave together art, technology, storytelling and theater,” she said, “we hope to provide attendees with a transformative experience, creating wonder, connection, realization and transcendence.”
Valentine also said that the old Stage 773 business model had been leading to financial losses, an issue naturally exacerbated by the pandemic. “Pivot is the most overused word of our time, but this is where we find ourselves and it describes our situation,” she said. “All of us at the helm of 773, in collaboration with our board, have been creatively assessing options for a new way forward.”
Under its former name of The Theatre Building (later Theatre Building Chicago), Stage 773 played a crucial role in the early development of Chicago’s off-Loop theater movement, housing hundreds of theater companies and shows since its founding in 1977 by the late Byron Schaeffer, Jr., a longtime theater professor at Northern Illinois University.
A former grocery warehouse acquired by Schaeffer for $250,000, the space originally had three, 148-seat theaters and became a catalyst for the development of Chicago’s Belmont Avenue as an entertainment district, and indeed for that section of Lakeview.
Notable actors who performed there include John Malkovich and Joan Allen (in Steppenwolf Theatre Company’s “Say Goodnight, Gracie” in 1979), William Petersen and Gary Cole (Remains Theatre production of “The Tooth of Crime” in 1982) and David Schwimmer (the Lookingglass Theatre production of “West” in 1991). For decades, the building specialized in offering space to companies that either could not afford their own homes or preferred to avoid that burden. Notable Chicago theater companies that were resident there at one point or another include Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Famous Door Theatre Company, Porchlight Music Theatre, Bailiwick Repertory Theatre and both Steppenwolf and Remains. And that is far from a complete list.
The Theatre Building, run for years by Ruth Higgins, Schaeffer’s widow, also produced new musicals under its own New Tuners moniker.
In 2010, the building was sold for $1 million to a group called Chicago Muse (then run by Sean Cercone, now the CEO and president of the powerful company Broadway Licensing); Chicago Muse then handed over the building in 2012 to Lukaba Productions, a group of investors associated with the Chicago director and improvisor Brian Posen (Lukaba also acquired the storefront directly to the east of the building). In more recent years, the building has specialized in burlesque, sketch comedy and improv festivals, although it continued to rent to groups like American Blues, Hell in a Handbag Productions and others.
Lukaba will remain the owner, and the yet-untitled producer of the yet-untitled show will operate under the Lukaba nonprofit umbrella with Valentine, Posen and the visual artist CoCo Ree Lemery involved as creatives and other artistic collaborators to be named later. The Posen Family Foundation will provide some of the funding for the show, although there are other investors.
The new venture has disrupted the plans of some longtime Stage 773 tenants, including Hell in a Handbag Productions and American Blues.
“Our finish line to surviving the pandemic and industry shutdown has been moved. In order to open for our artists and audiences this year, we’ll run a marathon disguised as a short sprint,” said American Blues artistic director Gwendolyn Whiteside. “We’re looking forward to reopening to live, in-person audiences for the 20th anniversary of ‘It’s a Wonderful Life: Live in Chicago!’ We are currently looking for a home. Like Mary Bailey, I’m throwing a rock and making a wish on a building.”
Much the same could be said for Lukaba, apparently coming out of the pandemic with a strikingly distinctive and ambitious enterprise.
Chris Jones is a Tribune critic.
