STRATFORD, CT – An ambitious plan for the former Shakespeare Theatre site in Stratford would see a reproduction of The Bard’s Globe 1614 Theatre on an arts campus with the prospect of attracting thousands of visitors each year. But with a charge of more than $70 million, it probably wouldn’t be cheap.
“We need to create something unique, a national treasure, a well-known ancient theatre,” said Tom Evans, a Stratford resident with experience in theater and business control that is the driving force of the idea.
“We have a blank whiteboard that hasn’t existed in Stratford for a long time,” Evans said in an initial discussion of the plans, which took place Thursday via Zoom. “… Everyone needs something ordinary to happen in this place.”
On early Saturday morning, an online petition supporting the company had more than six hundred signatures.
Evans’ collaborator in the task is Jim Warren, founding artistic director of the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, Virginia. Together, the two hope to build the campus of the American Shakespeare Festival, an artistic destination with the World Historic Recreation of the Globe 1614, as well as a modern performing arts center and a space for occasions.
The Stratford Globe would revel in Shakespeare’s plays as they would have been noticed in his life, with actors playing various roles and interacting with the crowd. The Center for the Performing Arts would level existing musicals and plays, and come with a black box theater for local art groups. Both buildings can also be rented for weddings and events.
The Globe would attract more than 300,000 visitors a year to Stratford and inject $50 million into the local economy, according to Evans, who noted that the best school and school academics are creating a built-in audience.
“We’re going to do Shakespeare in a way that no one is used to seeing Shakespeare finished,” he said.
Evans has budgeted the charge of boarding the campus, which will be controlled through a nonprofit theater professionals organization, at $77 million. Planned investment resources included $33 million from the New Markets Tax Credit Program, $32.5 million from personal investors, $7.5 million from an investor in a place to eat, and $4 million of a tax-exempt government bond. Initial project prices are budgeted at $1.8 million.
Evans her plan this week with Mayor Laura Hoydick and economic development director Mary Dean.
“I think it’s very exciting, it’s a wonderful vision,” Hoydick said.
Evans’ plan reminded him of a decades-ago proposal that was given a contract that never materialized, he said.
“That’s why the city is more cautious than otherwise, because they have burned in the past,” Hoydick said.
After last year’s fire, a Stratford subcommittee, of which Evans is a member, assessed the potential uses of the site, which is being transferred to the city across the state. The subcommittee is expected to provide its studies to the Stratford Redevelopment Agency in October.
Before any proposal, adding the Globe’s reproduction plan, could begin, it would have to be approved through the mayor’s office, the city council and the town halls and commissions.
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