NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — The coronavirus pandemic has touched every aspect of our lives, including the arts community. Professional and community theater groups are wondering how they will survive amid shutdowns and a lack of donations.
While the Little Theatre of Norfolk has been forced to close its curtain, for now, they are finding creative ways to still bring art to the community. After all, the show must go on.
“The theaters that are going to survive in the end are the ones that go small and local,” said B.A. Ciccolella, President of the Little Theatre of Norfolk.
The community theater group has been in the Mermaid City since 1926.
“We’re an all volunteer theatre. We’re here to be a part of the community,” said Ciccolella.
Back in March, the theatre was in the middle of its run of “A Piece of My Heart,” when the pandemic closed the curtain on the show.
Ciccolella said, “that morning, we sent out emails saying we won’t be holding the show because of the emergency situation.”
The staging is still up, almost frozen in time.
Little Theatre of Norfolk offered ticket refunds for their season, but few people took them up on the offer.
“The sheer percentage of people who chose to donate the cost of their ticket made us cry on multiple occasions, just overwhelming the support that we got from people basically saying ‘Yes, we would’ve loved to have seen these shows, but we want you to be here when this is over’,” said Ciccolella.
The theatre organization is determined to be here.
Ciccolella said, “Being able to do those smaller, local things, that’s kind of going to keep us in business.”
Earlier this month, they staged and streamed “Red Moon Rising in the East” a show written by a local playwright.
“It was a very small production,” said Ciccolella. “It was a one man show, I think we had a crew of 5 or 6 people, most of us did double duty in some way shape or form.”
Ciccolella doesn’t know when their productions will look normal again. She has some ideas for — safely — getting back on the stage, once the virus clears out.
“Doing a lot of our rehearsals, especially our table reads over Zoom, as opposed to bring in the building, only being in the building when we have to and then potentially being able to do some socially-distanced seating,” said Ciccolella.
She hopes they can open the theatre doors again in the spring of 2021. Regardless of the date, they’ll be prepared.
Ciccolella said, “Our goal is just to make sure that everything happens above board and safely for everyone until we can get our audiences back in and we can get back to having people on stage and making the art that we all decided to go into this industry to make.”
Until then, they’ll continue to make art in creative ways, proving that show will always go on.
The Little Theatre of Norfolk has extended its virtual streaming of “Red Moon Rising in the East” through the end of the month.