Newporters Will Have to Wait Another Week to Enjoy Casino Theatre

Dear Conjunction Theatre Company was scheduled to perform their one-man production on the life of Oscar Wilde, "More Lives Than One - Oscar Wilde and the Black Douglas," this week at the newly renovated Stanford White Casino Theatre.

The Paris-based theater company currently on tour in America was obviously thrilled at the idea of playing the Casino, telling fans on its blog, "The Casino Theater was where Oscar Wilde lectured on his American tour. Our show will be the first one there since its restoration."

But according to Casino Theatre Artistic Director Suzanne Delle, Dear Conjunction won't be getting the chance to christen the Casino Theatre after all. Delle cited lagging bureaucracy as the reason.

"We have not received the certificate of occupancy yet," Delle said, adding that even if the certificate arrived by the show date, it wouldn't allow enough time to prepare the stage for the show. "We wanted to play it safe and just make sure that this wonderful show could go on. So we moved it into the Megley Theater on campus."

The Megley Black Box Theatre at Salve Regina University holds about a quarter of the people that the 297-seat Casino Theater (with an 86-seat balcony) will accommodate. The size differential is one reason Delle is glad Salve's Theater Department will be calling the new venue home.

"In the past we never really advertised in the community because of the fact that we only had a 70-seat black box, and with our student body, we tend to fill that very quickly," she said.

The intimate black box space also meant students grew accustomed to performing basically for their friends.

"Now we can offer our student productions to the community in a way that we just couldn't before," Delle said. "Because now we don't have to worry about seating capacity."

And performing for the general public, according to Delle, will provide students with a wider learning experience.

While the International Tennis Hall of Fame owns the historic Casino Theatre building, designed by Stanford White and first opened in 1880, the building was restored with the understanding that Salve Regina's Theater Department would operate the theater and maintain its schedule of performances, which will include community productions.

Delle, a recent Newport transplant, has noted the sense of community surrounding the restoration project.

"People have a real love of that building," she said.

With the work completed and the bills paid, the restoration project can thank Newport's enthusiastic community for meeting the funding goal of almost $4.5 million.

"One of the most exciting things," Delle reported, "has been bumping into people in the community who say, 'I was on stage at the Casino,' or, 'I was in the audience at the Casino during those last few shows during the 1980s.'"

Delle, who has attended weekly project meetings throughout the restoration efforts, witnessed the challenges associated with creating a modern theater space while maintaining a historic appearance. The new theater, she said, has projection screens and a projector that drops from the ceiling. She chose Salve Regina's first theater production, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, upcoming in November, to take full advantage of this new addition to the theater.

"We can do more, technically, in the space," she said. "So for instance, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, the set design really just plops them down in a sort of a no-man's land white space. And then every setting that they go into will be projections."

Another modern accommodation within the Casino Theatre was the inclusion of sound system speakers.

"What they ended up doing," Delle explained, "was cutting space in the proscenium arch that they were then going to cover with material that is painted to look exactly like the rest of the proscenium arch, so that the speakers will in essence disappear."

Delle said she understands why people are excited to see a production in the new space, but she downplayed the idea that the Oscar Wilde production, despite its historical significance, was part of any formal "opening" of the Casino Theatre. That honor, she suggested, goes to a projected one-night production of H.M.S. Pinafore performed by New York's Blue Hill Troupe. Billed as the official "grand opening," it won't take place until June 25, 2011.

"Everything else in between," Delle maintained, "is a soft-opening."

Newport's anxious theater-going public will have to wait at least another week for even a "soft-opening" and the chance to see a show amid the Casino Theatre's gilded ornamentation and fabric-backed seats. On Saturday, Oct. 16, at 3 and 7 p.m., the musical wing of Salve's Performing Arts Department will present the orchestral Peter and the Wolf, with additional choreography and art work by Salve students, at the Casino. Delle said she has been assured that the certificate of occupancy will be in hand by then. However, on the preceding Friday, Oct. 15, Salve plans to treat all the fourth graders in Newport to a free, closed production of the show, which will make Newport's 4^th graders the first to experience the newly restored landmark theater in action.