Jerry McGonigle wasn’t overly optimistic when he took over as artistic director of West Virginia Public Theatre in 2016.
The organization had just cancelled its 2015 Christmas show, was buried in debt and on the verge of surrendering its nonprofit status.
“So we decided to put together a plan where we could create a partnership with the university but still maintain autonomy as a professional theater. We started with, roughly, if you sum it up, about $350,000 in debt that we inherited,” he said. “Honestly, when we started, I thought it might last a year or two. I said ‘We’ll give it the college try, but this ain’t gonna last.’ ”
Complicating matters was the reputation WVPT had garnered in the community — much of which stemmed more from business practices than on-stage performances.
McGonigle, a professor of acting and directing at WVU, is reluctant to offer details, but admits “There were places that said, ‘We don’t do business with you anymore,’ We’ve had to rebuild those relationships. I had a big job just in convincing my colleagues in the school of theatre and dance that things were going to be different … There’s a history there.”
But it did last, and month by month, WVPT paid what it owed, rebuilt relationships and implemented bookkeeping practices that once again made it eligible to apply for national grants from organizations like New York’s Shubert Foundation, which now helps support the nonprofit’s mission.
“I’m very proud of the work we’ve done and I’m proud of the productions and the relationships we’re developing with artists around the country – actors, writers, directors. But I think, and I’m surprised to say it, but one of the things I’m most proud of is that we’ve managed to dig ourselves out of this hole and are still able to produce theater,” McGonigle said.
WVPT paid off its debt in October 2020 — not exactly a booming time for the performing arts thanks to the ongoing pandemic.
McGonigle said COVID-19 has been, in a way, a mixed blessing as it cancelled an ambitious, and expensive, summer season in 2020 and allowed WVPT to step up its grant writing efforts while focusing on smaller productions, including a dramatic reading of MLK’s “A Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” and a radio-style performance of “A Christmas Carol.”
The WVPT Board of Directors is currently in the process of finalizing a new five-year plan.
Anticipated as part of that plan is a blossoming relationship as the resident theatre company of Oglebay Resort, where it’s performing “Jingle This” through Thursday.
Further, a partnership with Sean Cercone, who received an MFA from WVU and went on to found Broadway Licensing, has made West Virginia and WVPT players in developing new shows, which are performed free for a local audience before moving to stages elsewhere.
That will be the case on Jan. 10 when the Stephen King-penned “Ghost Brothers of Darkland County,” is performed, featuring music by John Mellencamp.
“We’ve got a director coming in with this project who’s won two Tony Awards and been nominated two or three other times. We’ve got the musical director from Wicked coming back,” McGonigle said.
“We’re hoping to be a place that has a national reputation as somewhere you can go and develop new work and also bring all these artists from around the country and the higher echelons of the producing world to know we’re here.”
Without the previous financial constraints, WVPT is also slowly expanding its own production lineup, adding a third show to its upcoming summer schedule — a one-man show based on the life of Thurgood Marshall coming to the Metropolitan Theatre on Juneteenth.
But if you can’t wait that long, WVPT’s “A Christmas Carol,” directed by McGonigle and adapted by Andy Lyons, will hit the stage Thursday and run through Sunday.
McGonigle said he’s optimistic about WVPT’s future, particularly with the stability afforded by its relationship with WVU.
He also acknowledges the vision of WVPT’s founder, Ron Iannone.
“I admire and am deeply indebted and impressed with what Ron did … They were doing five or six musicals a summer — big ones in the big theatre, all with four or five equity actors. In their heyday, it was impressive,” McGonigle said.
“I owe an incredible debt of gratitude for what he did as the founding director of this. He had vision. He had tenacity. I just think maybe things got too big, too fast and they never could quite catch up.”
For ticket information or to learn more about West Virginia Public Theatre, visit wvpublicthatre.org or call 304 992-6338.
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