Photo courtesy of Jaime Rae Turnbull
A construction team takes center stage at the soon-to-be A. Paul and Carol C. Schaap Center for the Performing Arts on Jefferson in Grosse Pointe Park.
GROSSE POINTE PARK — Starting late last year from a hole in the ground to now installing metal roof trusses, construction of the privately funded A. Paul and Carol C. Schaap Center for the Performing Arts is on the beam for a summer opening.
“We are thrilled with the construction progress made over the last six months due to favorable weather conditions, allowing contractors to complete the walls of the performance theater,” said Dr. Paul Schaap, the center’s major benefactor and a resident of the Park.
Four multi-story cinder block walls enclose what will be a 424-seat auditorium on Jefferson Avenue between Maryland in the Park and Alter in Detroit.
Until the roof is fully installed and covers the interior, a bird’s-eye view of work accomplished within the walls shows a stepped foundation for rows of tiered seating, an orchestra pit and a stage where, to all the world, men and women are merely players whether they like it or not.
Tall walls beside and behind the stage account for the fly loft, a vertical space generally rising twice the distance of the proscenium opening. Above and within the loft, curtains, scenery, lighting and props are raised and lowered during theatrical productions in such quick and seemingly magical fashion to excite Bottom’s pun, “This was lofty.”
“That height is required for the fly space, so you can put on ‘Mary Poppins’ and the chandelier from ‘The Phantom of the Opera,’” said Jaime Rae Turnbull, the center’s executive director, also from the Park. “All of that is going to make this incredible venue so valuable for our Grosse Pointe Theatre partner. Then there is supporting space, including the Manoogian Gallery and community gallery, the back of the house and dressing rooms.”
“The next phase of the project will form the remarkable architectural features on the perimeter of the building,” Schaap said.
“That is all going to be built with glass and metal,” Turnbull said. “You will not have the perception of height once the exterior is completed.
“A big crane is there to bring in the roof truss system,” she added. “That’s going to go quickly. Additional trusses that build out the exterior will start in May.”
As with most building constructions, the pace of progress picked up with setting the foundation.
“There was a basement created for the trap door,” Turnbull said. “Steps and all that goes into building a theater took a huge amount of time to do right.”
Photo courtesy of Jaime Rae Turnbull
Construction begins on walls fashioning the center’s Richard and Jane Manoogian Art Gallery, a community gallery, dressing rooms, wardrobe and symphony rooms.
She said completion is due in July. A soft, or limited, opening follows with the official opening marked by the Grosse Pointe Theatre debuting its next season in September.
“We will have some grand-opening events prior to the Grosse Pointe Theatre season,” Turnbull said. “We have ideas we’re working on to include all of our program partners, a menagerie of performance and visual exhibits for our soft opening.”
In addition to Grosse Pointe Theatre, the Schaap Center will be the performance home of the Detroit Concert Choir, Grosse Pointe Community Chorus and Grosse Pointe Symphony Orchestra.
Proposed community-based partners are the Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit Medical Orchestra, Detroit Public Television, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Opera Theatre, Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit, Pewabic Pottery, The Carr Center and The Sphinx Corporation.
“The amount of interest coming from partners looking for this intimate space is remarkable,” Turnbull said.