The Greenhouse Theater Center, known mostly as a rental facility in the years since the former home of Victory Gardens was sold by VG’s board to board members William and Wendy Spatz in 2008, has for the first time announced a three-production season of its own.
The Greenhouse plans to stage a new production of Sophie Treadwell’s 1928 play Machinal, directed by Greenhouse artistic director Jacob Harvey; Rose, featuring Linda Reiter as Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, a remount from the Greenhouse’s recent “Solo Celebration!” that’s directed by Steve Scott; and the Chicago premiere of Birds of a Feather, a comedy by Marc Acito inspired by the Central Park Zoo’s “gay penguins,” also directed by Harvey.
The Spatzes, who put the building up for sale in 2009 but failed to find a buyer, decided to dip their toes into production a few years ago, investing cash into upgrading the shopworn facilities and putting money behind Ronald Keaton’s one-man show Churchill, which was staged at the Greenhouse in 2014 under Keaton’s SoloChicago shingle and went on to an Off Broadway run. After Keaton and the Spatzes parted ways, the Greenhouse last January announced its own Solo Celebration!, a series of a dozen solo pieces that had staggered runs over an eight-month period from June 2016 to February 2017. That series was announced concurrently with the hiring of Harvey as artistic director.
Now the Greenhouse is offering a traditional subscription model, produced under Equity contracts (three-play subscriptions, at $93, and two-play flex passes, at $63, are on sale now), alongside its rentals and resident companies like Remy Bumppo and MPAACT. (Another longtime resident, American Blues Theater, is moving its productions to Stage 773.) It’ll be worth keeping an eye on the Greenhouse’s new growth.
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