I have to believe my own hype which is that everything can’t stay the same and sometimes new technology and building rehabs are for the best. And yet, when I read this in the PD today I was a bit nostalgic for the ‘old’ Hanna Theatre. The one from my youth, the one my Mom took me to – the wonderful field trip we had to it from AB Hart Jr. High. It seemed so massive and beautiful and timeless. Well, things change and certainly it’s been waiting for something to happen for a while now.
The PD’s Tony Brown covered this story and he talks about the high tech component going into The Hanna and that it may even be open for the Great Lakes Shows in September.
“….If all goes according to plan, the Hanna will reopen in September with Great Lakes’ Fall Repertory, joining the Ohio (Great Lakes’ current home), the State, the Palace and the Allen theaters in what has been called the nation’s largest performing arts center outside New York.
But unlike the other four, the Hanna — which until the 1980s was one of the country’s premier touring Broadway-show venues — will be transformed into a state-of-the-art venue for Great Lakes’ productions of Shakespeare and other classics. …”
It used to hold 1,400 seats and now will house about 500. And the claim is that it will “….retain the historic and architectural details of its neoclassical past. …” It has taken 27 years to restore Playhouse Square’s theatres and this is the last leg of that project.
I took the above photo from Cleveland Memory’s website….. check it out for more photos of the Hanna and her long season of glory. Do you have Hanna memories? Peace Out – 3C
(photo courtesy of clevelandmemory.org, The Cleveland Press Collection, Cleveland State University – photographer Herman Seld)
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