COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL | WEDNESDAY, MAY 8, 2019 | 7A
Theatre from A1
S entinel
C ottage G rove
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everybody in the house can
see them,” Goes said. “It
makes this whole space us-
able for acting, which it’s re-
ally not [now].”
Though plans also include
taking about four feet off the
thrust stage to make room
for more seating, the new
design will allow for about
12 more feet of space to
work with on the back wall.
“Because we’re gaining so
much playing space, it works
out,” said Goes.
Final plans estimate the
new house audience capaci-
ty to be between 195 and 200
people.
The house will also be
getting a new acoustic treat-
ment on its walls and speak-
er system.
Work with an acoustical
engineer is expected to yield
an enhanced house setup for
spoken word.
For the hearing impaired,
plans are to install a “hear-
ing loop,” which enables
people with a “T switch” on
their hearing aids to flip the
switch and get a direct feed
of the theater’s performance.
According to Goes, this
assistive listening technolo-
gy will be extended not only
to those with hearing aids.
“Even if you don’t have
a hearing aid that includes
that built in feature, which
all the modern ones do, you
can use headphones with
this system,” she said. “You
can even have an app on an
iPhone and literally tap into
the sound.”
Other upgrades will in-
clude retrofitting of a fire
sprinkler system, aisle light-
ing, larger restrooms, and
seating which meets Amer-
icans with Disabilities Act
standards.
In total, the project will
see a 2,087-square-foot
building expansion from its
current square footage of
Chorus from A1
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than 100 singers. In its
heyday, the division had
even taken second place at
the society’s international
competition.
Today, the group has a
little more than 30 active
members who will take
the stage next month in
Cottage Grove in a set of
performances which will
include quartets Social In-
security and Four C Sons
made up mostly of Cascade
Chorus members who have
refined their own acts.
“The object of barber-
shop is to do what they call
‘ring chords,’” Martindale
explained, “which when
you hit the chords exactly
right to create an overtone,
which is the desired effect.”
Martindale’s quartet, So-
cial Insecurity, blends the
barbershop sound with co-
medic performances and
has achieved its own noto-
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9,197 to 11,284. This brings
the theater a long way from
its humble beginnings of
performing under an army
surplus parachute in 1982.
The theater considers its
“ACT I” as occurring in 1998
when its current facility was
first built. Next came “ACT
II” in 2006, which involved
the expansion of its lobby
and addition of a rehearsal
hall.
In the context of the the-
ater’s steady growth, ACT III
can be seen as an affirmation
of the nonprofit’s continued
success.
“This is a project that
we’ve really been working on
of quite a number of years,”
Goes said. “It has its roots
back in 2011 when we did a
huge comprehensive strate-
gic planning process.”
In the preceding years, the
theater had actually been
forced to turn people away
as it sold out around half its
shows. Despite this, the non-
profit was struggling to keep
a balanced budget.
The price of running a
volunteer theater includes
costs such as costumes, set
design and paying royalties
to creators of shows — musi-
cal royalties alone can range
from $5,000 to $8,000 per
production.
The board of directors
in the strategic planning
process looked at income
sources such as ticket sales,
individual donations, show
sponsorships and program
ads.
With stable participation
of advertisers and sponsors
each year and the sheer
lack of bandwidth to do any
more productions, these
were determined not be via-
ble growth areas.
In donations, Goes said
the theater has terrific sup-
port and receives a reliable
increase of three to four per-
cent per year.
This left ticket sales, but
there was no interest among
board members in bumping
prices.
“We don’t want to price
ourselves out of the market,”
said Goes, “We want to be
affordable for as many peo-
ple as possible.”
Because revenue streams
could not substantially be
altered, members started
looking at increasing capac-
ity. In 2013 they hired GMA
Architects out of Eugene to
assess the situation and by
2014 they had chosen a de-
sign.
“Then we really spent a
couple of years doing our
internal homework,” said
Goes.
Though the summer of
2019 was finally selected as
a construction date, con-
structing costs have not
stayed at original estimates.
The price has skyrocketed
from what was considered
a $1.5 million project a year
ago to its’s current price tag
of $2.5 million.
“So we are scrambling for
dollars at this point,” Goes
said.
To cover the cost, the the-
ater must take out a loan,
but is also relying on grant
money, $40,075 of which
has already come from the
Oregon Cultural Trust. The
project is also being lobbied
for by the Cultural Advoca-
cy Coalition, a nonprofit ad-
vocacy group that advances
public investment in art,
heritage and humanities.
“We are part of a consor-
tium of six arts construction
projects that are lobbying for
some lottery bond funding,”
Goes said.
Being part of the consor-
tium increases the chances
of receiving funding as the
projects have already been
vetted by the commission.
Though Cottage Theatre
was part of a similar con-
sortium in 2017, it received
less than had been asked for,
prompting entry into this
year’s cycle as well.
As the new fiscal year
nears, Goes hopes that the
Oregon Legislature will find
room in the budget for the
arts among other contenders
such as libraries and city in-
frastructure projects.
Helping its chances, the
theater’s construction proj-
ect has already been recog-
nized as a possible economic
stimulant.
“Part of the reason that
we got endorsed for this po-
tential lottery bond funding
is the potential economic
development impact of this
project,” Goes said. “Last
year … only 25 percent of
our audience had an address
in the 97424 Cottage Grove
ZIP Code. So, 75 percent of
our audience is coming from
somewhere else.”
For a city looking to in-
crease its tourism revenue,
Goes believes numbers like
these make the theater an-
other oar in the water.
“Lots of people go out to
eat before a show and so that
affects local restaurants,”
said Goes. “The folks com-
ing from farther away many
times will stay overnight.”
Goes added that about 10
percent of the theater’s au-
dience travels more than 50
miles, which qualifies them
as tourists according to the
statewide tourism agency
Travel Oregon. Subsequent-
ly, the agency has given the
theater a $20,000 grant to-
ward the construction proj-
ect.
“So right now as an insti-
tution, we are a magnet to
Cottage Grove,” Goes said,
“and it’s our hope that peo-
ple, while here, might tour
a covered bridge, eat at a
restaurant, run across to
Walmart to buy something.”
With construction set to
begin as soon as loans are
approved, the theater looks
to reopen its doors Oct. 11
with “The Complete Works
of William Shakespeare
(abridged) [Revised].”
riety by routinely placing
in the top 10 of regional
barbershop competitions.
The setlist for the May
19 show will include clas-
sics, showtunes and popu-
lar numbers the crowd will
recognize.
“We’re doing our best to
keep the ticket prices low
so families can enjoy it,”
said Friends of the Cottage
Grove Carousel President
Don Williams.
Tickets for the event
will be $5. Following the
musical performances, an
optional all-you-can-eat
waffle dinner with four
choices of fruit toppings
and gluten-free options
will be provided for an ad-
ditional $8.
Proceeds from the event
will go toward the Cottage
Grove Carousel, a recon-
struction project which is
inching toward comple-
tion.
“We’re moving the focus
from construction to fund-
raising,” Williams said of
the carousel project.
With about $90,000 re-
maining to be raised before
the carousel can plant itself
in a temporary plot that
will make it accessible to
the public, Friends of the
Cottage Grove Carousel
are hopeful fundraising
events like this will help
them meet their goals.
“We’re 100 percent vol-
unteer,” said Williams. “We
need to raise $1.3 million
to find a permanent home
for a restored carousel.”
The carousel’s lighting,
computer system, and tent
cover are among the last
items on the construction
list, but the project will
only be entering another
phase with its own slew of
challenges once those are
completed.
As a leasing agreement
moves forward with Brad’s
Cottage Grove Chevrolet
to allow the carousel tem-
porary space on its lot, the
attraction must now look
for a revenue stream.
“When we erect it onto
Brad’s lot, then we will have
vendors that will come in
and another generating
opportunity for finances,”
said Friends of the Cottage
Grove Carousel Vice Pres-
ident Alice Nowicki, “but
there are still all those un-
knowns.”
Other potential costs
such as staffing and secu-
rity systems have yet to
be explored and will like-
ly continue the need for
fundraising and donations
of skilled labor.
“We desperately need
volunteers,” said carousel
board member Linda Sex-
ton.
As well as accepting vol-
unteers, the group is en-
couraging locals to sponsor
items such as the horses
and chariots on the car-
ousel. Over the next sev-
eral months, a number of
fundraising events are also
scheduled to take place.
“We want to have it op-
erating by summer if at all
possible,” Williams said.
Tickets to the Cascade
Chorus performance can
be found at the Cottage
Grove Sentinel, Book Mine,
Cascade Home Center,
Chamber of Commerce in
CG and Chamber of Com-
merce and The Creswell
Chronicle and Cascade
Home Center in Creswell.
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