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Here’s a riddle for you….  Name a theater in the city of Atlanta that’s more than 300 seats but less than 500 seats that you can rent…. waiting…. waiting…
Oh!  You guessed the Balzer Theater!  Nope.  It’s only 200!   Hmmmm…  What about the 14th street playhouse?  Ding!  Ding!  Ding!  Yes.  Hypothetically, you could rent the 14th Street Playhouse main stage, it’s a great space which is just under 400.  However, ‘Menopause the Musical‘ (not kidding… this is among the most commercially popular shows in history) has rented the space for a year and is likely to extend for another. 
This leaves no space for anyone to rent of this size.  If the Rialto is too big and one of the 100-200 seaters is too small… your Concert/Production/Musical etc… skips Atlanta.  There is also now a scarcity if open venue houses that can house companies.  The closest thing is the Academy Theater in Avondale, and while that’s at least MARTA Accessible and ITP, it’s not in the city or walking distance from a train station. 
We need another venue.  We need a place for Galaxy Music Theatre or Theatre Gael to mount larger works!  … and the solution could be out there. 
For years now, the Backstreets Building has stood empty.  No one has taken it on.  Why not convert it into a 375 theater with a black box above?  It would be perfect.  The location can support the traffic, it’s in the city, the Peachtree Street Car will go right by.  With the Fox Theater five block south, and the Playhouse and Woodruff Arts Center a few blocks north, the location is perfect.  Atlanta would see more productions, Midtown would stay vibrant, and theatrical companies would have more opportunities! 
By the way…If you want a complete list of venues around town, you should checkout the Atlanta Performs list.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 29th, 2005 at 11:10 am and is filed under Venues and Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.