Greenville Theatre is the Upstate's oldest and largest producing professional theatre. They are proud to have been voted “Best of the Upstate” for five consecutive years. They also offer an educational program that impacts over 35,000 schoolchildren a year. They pride themselves in showcasing incredible local talent, producing Broadway caliber productions, and being a destination of choice. Located on historic Heritage Green, Greenville’s cultural campus, they attract the largest audiences of any local company in the state, performing for over 85,000 theatregoers a season. Their home is a beautiful mid-century modern, 571 seat proscenium stage theatre. They are proudly celebrating their 96th season this year! But we're going to get back to life again.Greenville Theatre performs for more people than any other producing theatre in SouthĬarolina. We're all going to be a little smarter, a little more cautious. “We're going to get people back in the seats. “Everybody has helped the arts to survive COVID.”Īllen is looking ahead. “People have been so supportive,” Suzanne says. For now, they are ready to reopen the doors. You don't get good results that way.”Īllen and Suzanne acknowledge that “a day will come” when they aren’t involved in theater. It's easy, as a director, to criticize actors. “You need a nurturing person,” Allen says. Quinlan spent two weeks with the theater last year. “This is our transition year,” Suzanne says. Allen will direct “A Flea in Her Ear” in the spring. Suzanne will direct “The Hound of the Baskervilles” in October. Quinlan will direct three plays this season and also pick the lineup and casts for the 2022-2023 season. Meanwhile, the board – with input from the McCallas – hired Max Quinlan as Producing Artistic Director. “As a director, when the show opens, you've already started on your next job,” Suzanne says. While actors are performing one play, the rest of the staff – director, set designers, costume makers, and another cast of actors – start working on the next production in the rehearsal hall. Most everyone is on the move all of the time. Often, they must move the set off the stage so actors can rehearse or perform that night. Currently, the crew builds the sets on the stage. The proposal includes a workshop for building sets. The theater also hopes to raise funds for an addition to its 50-year-old building. Most schools pay for the performances, but the theater tries to waive their fee for economically challenged schools. Grants and sponsorships help with the cost of mainstage plays, as well as the schools program, called Greenville Theatre on Tour. They prepare a children’s play – with a set, costumes and props – stuff it all into a van, drive to the school, set up, perform for 300 to 500 children, strike the set, and rush back to the theater to help out. The theater also has a full-time, six-person acting troupe that travels to as many as 75 elementary schools a year throughout the Upstate. Expansive plays, like “Mary Poppins,” can cost $100,000 to produce. The theater, located in Heritage Green, has 600 seats. Back in the ’50s, it didn't confuse people. “There’s nothing little about the Greenville Theatre. New York City was “big theater,” he says. When regional and local theaters sprung up in the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s, he says, they were called “little” theaters to differentiate them from Broadway. “The theater hasn't been ‘little’ since the 40s,” Allen says. When the McCallas arrived, and until about two years ago, the theater was The Greenville Little Theatre. (Sam caught the acting bug, too, and works at the Barter Theatre in Virginia.) So, they set their sights on stable jobs and found them at the Greenville theater. They were working in Dallas when their theater troupe disbanded, and their 4-year-old son, Sam, was ready to start school. Greenville wasn’t necessarily part of the script. They celebrated their 39th wedding anniversary on May 1. A Greenville native, Allen was in the graduate program after earning his bachelor’s at Wofford College. Suzanne and Allen have been “on the bus” since they met at the University of South Carolina in Columbia. It's about time for me to get off the bus.” “A lot of theater people needed to get off the bus, and you don't get off the bus because you can’t,” Suzanne says.
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