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Journal Opinion
"Playhouse Deserves SupportWe applaud last week's announcement of an agreement involving the Youngstown Playhouse board of directors, the Save Our Stage Committee and former executive director Bentley Lenhoff. The two-month dispute between the Playhouse board and those who called for different leadership threatened to bring down the curtain on the community theater. We commend the two members of the board who stepped down so compromise could be facilitated, and we recognize the outstanding efforts of the new board president, Anthony Donofrio, who put in long hours bringing all sides together to make consensus happen. What matters now is restoring the Youngstown Playhouse to its position as one of the nation's largest and most successful community theaters. And if the plans unveiled last week are any indication, Playhouse supporters are well on their way to achieving that goal.Just days after the Playhouse board voted to hire Lenhoff, he unveiled a slate of shows for the 2004-05 season along with a plan to restore the 80-year-old theater to fiscal health. The multifaceted plan includes aggressive season-ticket and community-support campaigns, restoration of the successful Youth Theater program, youth and adult theater classes, community outreach initiatives and stern fiscal management to address existing debts. Lenhoff says he has received calls pledging financial support, and he has been in touch with the Playhouse's various creditors. We're encouraged by the audacious plan being put forth by Lenhoff, and urge the community to show its support -- by participating in shows, attending productions and donating to the community support campaign. But the Playhouse's ultimate salvation won't be realized by wistfully looking back at its glory days. Any plan to address its future has to address the realities of the environment in which it operates -- not only the theater's South Side location, which we have argued has played a role in its declining sales in recent years, but also the still-struggling local economy and the expansion of leisure time options. When Lenhoff last served as executive director in 1985, cable television and videocassette recorders were still gaining footholds in American homes. Today both are just a few of the options present in most American homes, not to mention satellite television, DVD players, home computers and the Internet. To succeed today, the Playhouse has to offer innovative and engaging productions and aggressively market them."Give us a chance," Lenhoff urges in calling for contributions. "I'm not going to ask more than once, this season only. If we can't make it, we don't deserve to be supported. but I'm going to promise you one thing: What you see on that stage this year will deserve your support and merit it."It's show time."