Considering all the deathwatches and obituaries for small-to-medium theaters we've seen this year, last week brought a wonder of wonders: news about the opening of a theater. Or, rather, the new availability of an old theater. Theatre Off Jackson in the International District will begin coproducing a regular season this fall and has announced an impressive first-year lineup, including work by Sarah Rudinoff, a new Scot Augustson Western, and Keri Healey's Cherry, Cherry, Lemon.
The Theatre Off Jackson has been a working theater since 1987, devoted to work by Northwest Asian American Theatre. NWAAT stopped producing regularly two years ago and the theater has largely been a rental space and home for the Asian American Film Festival. Now NWAAT veterans Patti West and Frank Phillips are opening TOJ to a wider stable of artists, though NWAAT will remain the resident company.
"We didn't want to do this under the NWAAT moniker because its mission is too narrow," West said. "But we want to provide a house where people can self-produce or coproduce without burning up their whole budget on rent."
West said Re-bar was a big inspiration for the theater, which will take after a for-profit model, projecting 90 percent earned income (tickets, rent, and liquor sales) and 10 percent grant money. The theater will host a fundraiser this Saturday, with performances from artists in TOJ's first season, to help pay for a summer renovation to expand its lobby and add a bar.
And what about the tangles with city code that have put small theaters like the Union Playhouse and JEM out of business? "We get inspected every year," West assured me. "We're fine."
Last week also brought a theater critics' workshop, sponsored by the Seattle Times and the American Theatre Critics Association (who knew there was such a thing?). Since I participated, it would be gauche to report on the proceedings, and let's be frank--who, besides us practitioners of the dark art of criticism, would even care? I can relate, however, that we saw shows, wrote and critiqued our own reviews, and heard tales of critics behaving badly: drinkers who snored in their seats, playwright-critics with actress-wives who juried local theater awards, and an entrepreneur who made thousands of dollars scalping her comps to Broadway openings.
But the worst offense of the weekend was mine: I went out for a beer and a burger before going to see The Woman in Black at ACT and stupidly dressed too warmly for the theater. I spent the show sweating out a revolting miasma of grease, onions, and bar smells. It gets worse: midway through the first act, I crossed my legs and noticed, to my terrible shame, the sudden smell of dog shit coming from my shoes. Many apologies to my fellow critics, audience members, and ACT Theatre for eating onions, not watching my step, and being scarier than the play.
