Groups differ on saving landmark playhouse

Posted on Thursday, May. 26, 2005

Groups differ on saving landmark playhouse

	AS IT STANDS: The Coconut Grove Playhouse, as seen on Wednesday, is the subject of redevelopment talk.
PATRICK FARRELL/HERALD STAFF

Plans to bring radical changes to the Coconut Grove Playhouse have ignited an effort to save the historic structure.

BY ANDRES VIGLUCCI
aviglucci@herald.com

To directors of the iconic but financially struggling Coconut Grove Playhouse, a plan to build condos and a new theater on the property is a matter of survival -- even though it could mean razing all or part of its stately old home.

To preservationists and combative Grove activists, it's a call to battle.

The mission, as they see it: first, to save one of Coconut Grove's oldest, most distinctive and beloved buildings, the theater where the U.S. premiere of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot took place in 1956. And then to make sure no condo tower ever looms over the theater and the low-scale village around it.

Already, it's turning into the kind of knock-down, drag-out fight that is a Grove hallmark.

''If the playhouse thinks just because they're the playhouse that they can do this, tear down this wonderful building, there will be a revolution,'' said Grove lawyer and activist Tucker Gibbs, practically sputtering with anger.

Much to the chagrin of the playhouse, Grove activists have allied with preservationists to revive a stalled petition to declare the 1926 building historic -- a move that would bar demolition of its Mediterranean Revival exterior, and possibly of the entire structure.

CONDITION DISPUTED

Playhouse board members say the building may be too deteriorated to save, but preservationists dispute that, saying it should be renovated.

The city's Historic and Environmental Preservation Board will consider the petition on June 7. Preservationists say it should be an open-and-shut case, given the building's history and architectural distinction.

The playhouse was designed in a Spanish rococo style by Richard Kiehnel, one of the most influential and admired of early Miami architect, who also designed Miami Senior High and Coral Gables Congregational Church.

Built as a movie house, the playhouse was converted to live theater in the 1950s and has long been regarded as a cultural treasure. The list of stars who have appeared on its stage includes Liza Minnelli, Jimmy Buffett, Tallulah Bankhead, Bert Lahr, Gypsy Rose Lee, Henry Fonda, Carol Channing, Shelley Winters and José Ferrer, who also served as its artistic director for two years in the 1980s.

''It's meant a lot to a lot of people,'' said Estelle Overstreet, 97, who was the secretary to the theater's developer, Irving J. Thomas.

Miami Herald Staff	MARSHA HALPER/HERALD STAFF
Opening Show: Waiting for Godot opened at the Coconut Grove Playhouse in 1956. It featured Tom Ewelll, left, Scott Smart and Bert Lahr.	OLD SOUVENIR: Longtime resident Estelle C. Overstreet's scrapbook contains a 1927 playbill.

UNCERTAINTY

Even if the building is designated, however, its future could remain uncertain.

The playhouse board has announced it is teaming up with a developer in a multimillion-dollar deal to build a theater, 100 luxury condos and a multilevel parking garage on the prominent corner property on Main Highway in downtown Coconut Grove. Aside from the theater, the site contains surface parking lots and outbuildings that are not historically significant.

The nonprofit theater's board, which took control of the property last year from the state of Florida, insists that it has no fleshed-out plan yet. There has been no decision to demolish the building, board member Maurice Weiner emphasized.

Weiner wouldn't say whether the playhouse will contest the historic designation.

''That process will just have to play itself out,'' he said. ``In the Grove, nothing comes easy.''

But Weiner said the theater has struggled financially since the state withdrew all financial support last year, and it requires revenue from redevelopment to survive. Weiner and other playhouse directors say the building may be unsalvageable because it was built with corrosive sea sand.

''We've had some studies done that say the building is not sustainable,'' Weiner said. ``But the developer is taking a fresh look at all of this.''

Balderdash, say activists and preservationists. Documents kept by Overstreet show it was built with clean sand mined from a nearby pit, they say.

NO SEA SAND

''You take my word for it; we did not use sea sand when we built the theater,'' said Overstreet, a Grove resident for 90 years, in a phone interview. ``It's an excuse to tear it down. The sand came from well-known builders.''

Structural deterioration doesn't make old structures unsalvageable, said Richard Heisenbottle, president of Dade Heritage Trust and an architect responsible for the lauded restorations of Miami City Hall and the Olympia Theater downtown.

''This is to be expected in old, historic structures and you fix them,'' Heisenbottle said. ``There's certainly a cost factor, but it's not necessarily any more costly than tearing down what's there and building everything new.''

Heisenbottle said the playhouse has enough room on its property for the new, small theater its board wants, plus a parking garage and other development, without demolishing the old theater.

KEEP THE FACADE

One possibility the playhouse board has raised would be to preserve the building's facade only and incorporate it into the new development.

But that doesn't sit well with many preservationists, who deride it as a hollow sort of preservation -- a ''facedectomy,'' as some call it. Although the interior has been substantially altered over the years, the auditorium retains the original proscenium -- the stage area -- and some contend it ought to be protected as well.

The preservationists question why the playhouse board would contemplate tearing the building down when it's scheduled to receive $15 million for repairs and restoration from county bonds approved by voters in November.

Weiner said the bond money would help meet playhouse needs, and the board will make a specific proposal to the county soon on how it would spend the funds.

The preservation board has the power to confer designations. Owners can appeal to the city commission, but its members have overturned relatively few board designations in recent years.

Commissioner Johnny Winton, whose district includes the Grove, said he is inclined to support preservation unless the playhouse persuades him it would cost many unjustifiable millions to repair.

''I like the idea of saving the building, and I don't believe it will take that,'' Winton said.

CHANGES REQUIRED

The redevelopment the playhouse envisions would require rezoning and changes to the county's comprehensive development plan because the site is designated for government use, which effectively bars commercial development like the playhouse envisions.

Moreover, the downtown Grove has a strict five-story height limit to protect its village feel, and residents are vowing to fiercely oppose not just demolition, but anything higher than five stories at the playhouse site.

''I understand their plight, but you don't have to make the theater an appendage of this humongous development project,'' said Becky Roper Matkov, executive director of Dade Heritage Trust, Miami-Dade County's largest preservation group. ``The Grove has always had a unique cachet, and if you start lining it with tall buildings, all of its charm is going to dissolve.''

Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder