Tag: Craig Wiroll Oregon Historic Theatre Restoration

The show must go on

Posted on by Julia Havens

This year, the Community Planning Workshop at the University of Oregon explored its glamorous side with the Oregon Historic Theaters Project. Robert Parker, CPW Director and Project Advisor, along with Aniko Drlik-Muehleck, Project Manager, hit the road with student team members Dana Nichols, Rodney Bohner, John Jackson, and Craig Wiroll to explore these incredible cultural gems that have anchored downtown’s and delighted audiences throughout the state of Oregon for over 50 years.

ABOUT THE PROJECT
CPW undertook a 3-part investigation of historic theaters and their potential to act as economic development catalysts. Phase 1 located theaters across the state that qualified as “historic” (50 years or older).

Phase 2 began in January 2015 with a needs assessment surveys sent to theaters asking operators and owners to explain their business model and describe their needs related to building rehabilitation and maintenance, equipment upgrades, programming, and marketing.

Phase 3 coordinated marketing, where CPW worked with theater operators and owners along with regional tourism agencies to explore marketing strategies and link theater professionals with Oregon’s tourism industry to help theaters capitalize on their historic and entertainment value.

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?
This project comes at a particularly critical moment for downtown theaters. The rising cost of maintenance and operation has dealt a hefty financial blow and forced many theaters to close their doors. Movie theaters, for example, face $50,000 minimum to upgrade to digital projection systems. In a town with less than 3000 people, how can a theater afford such an investment? As it turns out, not too many as you will see by the statistics and theatre fans in this video documenting the Oregon Historic Theatres project.

Together with Oregon Main Street, Pacific Power, and Travel Oregon (project partners), CPW hopes this project will build on the energy of grassroots movements across the state and the documentation, needs assessments, and tourism coordination will answer questions and will generate resources so historic theaters can adapt. And as they say in theatre, the show must go on!

Special to curtain call to Craig Wiroll, who took on the CPW video challenge and produced one amazing video that truly captures the story of this project. Thank you Craig.

About the Oregon Historic Theatres Team from left to right:

Aniko Drlik-Muehleck, Dana Nichols, Rodney Bohner, John Jackson, Craig Wiroll

Aniko Drlik-Muehleck, originally from Berkeley, CA, is now a Master of Community and Regional Planning candidate at the University of Oregon and participated in the Community Service Center’s RARE AmeriCorps Program – Resource Assistance for Rural Environments with the City of Pendleton from 2012-2013. 

Craig Wiroll is a journalist and farmer-turned-Master of Public Administration student with high hopes of changing the world. For now, he’s just going to focus on the UO Campus. Craig is also a two-time AmeriCorps alum from Wisconsin, who enjoys public radio, hiking and food. 

Dana Nichols is a first year Community and Regional Planning student who enjoys cooking, gardening, and playing with her cat, Dinkus. Although she is a New Jersey native and could live off their delicious pizza, Dana would much rather be watching a Packer game in Wisconsin or sailing on a boat in Maine. 

John Jackson is a Midwesterner is a first year Community and Regional Planning Masters student at the University of Oregon. Growing up both in Chicago, Illinois and Lincoln, Nebraska, Jackson is an avid geographer who has taken his talents to the Pacific Northwest to study the craft of urban planning and the unique ways of land use, built environment, and transportation that U of O has to offer. 

Rodney Bohner is a concurrent Master’s student in Community and Regional Planning as well as Historic Preservation at the University of Oregon. Originally from Pennsylvania, Rodney has worked on cultural resource projects in the Keystone state as well as Colorado, West Virginia, and Massachusetts.

 

Get Your Popcorn Ready!

Posted on by Julia Havens

Push Play

The Community Planning Workshop’s (CPW) Oregon Historic Theatre Preservation Team have begun our initial stages in helping to build a framework for the revitalization of downtown historic theatres throughout the state of Oregon.

Historic theatres are not only an all-American pastime, they also boosts tourism and stimulates downtown economic activity within cities and towns. Our team will be taking advantage of our partnership with Oregon Main Street, Pacific Power, and Travel Oregon that will enable us to gain expert insight in creating a lasting blueprint to increase economic vitality and boost tourism in downtowns all over the state.

Before our team conducted additional independent research, we first gathered and consolidated all previous research to eliminate redundancy and use our data efficiently. This involved pouring over theatre inventory spreadsheets, websites, and then double, or even triple checking all of our facts and figures.

Sounds like fun, right?

Craig Wiroll Community Planning Workshop CPW Oregon Historic Theatres RestorationWell, actually, it is! In addition to reviewing interesting facts, archived photographs, and even the occasional “epic story”, our team took to the streets of downtown Eugene to visit our very own McDonald Theatre. We received a one-of-a-kind in-depth look at the theatre; dressing rooms, projectionist booth, backstage, rafters, everywhere! Our tour guide, production manager, Jason Way, provided us with more information and theatre education than we originally thought possible.

McDonald Theatre is mainly a live music venue these days, but they do show the occasional movie every now and then for old times’ sake. It was built in 1925, and ownership is now in the hands of the Kit Kesey, nephew of world-renowned author Ken Kesey, who has owned it since 2009.

Hitting the Road

Craig Wiroll Community Planning Workshop CPW Oregon Historic Theatres RestorationInspired by our first trip, fellow teammate, Dana Nichols, and myself took an additional field trip to Alberta Rose Theatre located in Portland, Oregon. The building is remarkably similar to the McDonald Theatre; both have attached business storefronts, primarily to the left of the front entrance. The Alberta Rose Theatre was built 2 years after the McDonald Theatre and both are constructed in the same poured concrete style.

Although there are close to 100 historic theatres throughout Oregon, our team is going to do our best to visit as many of them as possible. As good as reviewing historic documentation, phoning theatre owners, scanning old newspapers, and polling community members is, nothing compares to visiting the theatre and feeling the aura elicited from the marquee.

Stay tuned in for more interesting updates about our research, findings, and field trips.

 

Craig Wiroll Community Planning Workshop CPW Oregon Historic Theatres RestorationAbout the Author: Craig Wiroll is a journalist and farmer-turned-Master of Public Administration student with high hopes of changing the world. For now, he’s just going to focus on the UO Campus. Craig is also a two-time AmeriCorps alum from Wisconsin, who enjoys public radio, hiking and food. Craig also works at the Student Sustainability Coalition and is the founding member of a UO volunteer/action group based around food issues.