Firehouse Theater Company.

In the summer of 1963, University of Minnesota graduate student Marlow S. Hotchkiss, artist James F. Faber, actor John Shimek, and actor and director Charles Morrison III renovated an 1894 fire station in Minneapolis, Minnesota as the Firehouse Theater. The group conceived the theater as a venue for avant-garde drama and as a vehicle for new playwrights in the Twin Cities area. The company relocated to San Francisco in 1969.

From the description of Firehouse Theater Company records, 1963-1974. (University of California, Davis). WorldCat record id: 56838882

History

Administrative History

In the summer of 1963, University of Minnesota graduate student Marlow S. Hotchkiss, artist James F. Faber, actor John Shimek, and actor and director Charles Morrison III renovated an 1894 firestation in Minneapolis, Minnesota as the Firehouse Theater. The group conceived the theater as a venue for avant-garde drama and as a vehicle for new playwrights in the Twin Cities area. The Firehouse Theater Company's first play The Connection by Jack Gelber, opened on August 22, 1963. The evening included a post-play discussion between the audience and the cast and director, which became a regular feature of Firehouse Theater productions.

The Firehouse Theater Company changed direction in 1965 with the departure of Shimek and Morrison. Marlow Hotchkiss, now managing director, brought on Sydney Schubert Walter, a member of the Open Theater in New York, as artistic director. The theater group reincorporated as a non-profit organization and acquired grants from the Rockefeller Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Hotchkiss and Walter also increased the number of original plays they produced and conducted workshops for the ensemble's personal development.

American playwright Sam Shepard premiered his play Fourteen Hundred Thousand in 1966 at the Firehouse Theater. In the same year, the group also performed Open Theater playwright Megan Terry's new play, Viet Rock . In 1968, the Firehouse Theater Company premiered Terry's new play, Jack-Jack at the Firehouse Theater and in-house playwright Nancy Walter's first play, Rags . In addition to new plays, the Firehouse Theater Company continued presenting plays by Ionesco, Brecht, Beckett, and other Theater of the Absurd playwrights. Audience participation developed as part of the group's experimentation with acting as a shared discovery.

After losing their lease at the old fire station in Minneapolis in 1969, the Firehouse Theater Company relocated to San Francisco, where they opened a theater on California Street at Polk and experimented with communal living. Their first season in San Francisco opened with Blessings on March 20, 1970.

By 1974, many of the original Firehouse Theater group had left to pursue other interests. Sydney Walter returned to school to complete a doctorate in psychology. Marlow Hotchkiss decided to concentrate on films. He also moved out of the commune. Nancy Walter continued writing plays and books. The company's original group of actors also moved on. The Firehouse Theater Company no longer produced experimental works. Instead, they turned towards other styles of theatrical productions.

Sources:

Aronson, Arnold. Avant-garde Theatre: A History . London: Routledge, 2000.

Schechner, Richard. "Six Axioms for Environmental Theatre." In The Drama Review: Thirty Years of Commentary on the Avant-garde, ed. Brooks McNamara and Jill Dolan, 151-171. Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research Press, 1986.

Shank, Theodore. American Alternative Theater . New York: Grove Press, Inc., 1982.

Szilassy, Zoltan. American Theatre of the 1960s . Carbondale and Edwardsville, IL: Southern Illinois Press, 1986.

Walsh, Richard. Radical Theatre in the Sixties and Seventies . Halifax, England: British Association for American Studies, 1993.

From the guide to the Firehouse Theater Company Archives, 1963-1974, (University of California, Davis. General Library. Dept. of Special Collections.)