When the curtain closed on the final performance of the Prairie Players production of “Into the Woods” at Galesburg’s Orpheum Theatre this past weekend, it also closed the Orpheum’s 2024-2025 season.
The historic theater will now remain shuttered until mid-September for structural repairs, specifically to fix a wall surrounding the stage area. Executive Director Andrew Driscoll told TSPR the Orpheum’s facility team has been monitoring the wall for years now – and that it appears to be moving.
“Moving in a direction which is not a positive direction because it reduces the integrity of the roof, which then puts the roof at risk of coming in,” Driscoll said. “It's probably incontrovertible that if something like that would occur, that's the end of the existence of the Orpheum. Soon to be 109 years old, it's probably not something that is going to get repaired, especially if the Orpheum does not have the type of resources to be able to do that.”
Driscoll said the theater brought in a structural engineer who determined there wasn’t much time to wait, so the Orpheum began exploring options to fund the repairs.
He said the Orpheum is “very, very fortunate” that State Senator Mike Halpin, D-Rock Island, was able to secure a $500,000 line-item appropriation for the theater in the state budget approved by lawmakers in late May.
“So that is just huge because without that, we would be coming to the community and saying, please help us repair this wall so we can continue to operate for years to come,” Driscoll said.
Growing attendance
With a combination of shows presented by the Orpheum and use of the theater by local organizations for their events, Driscoll said the Orpheum saw at least 10,000 more visitors this season than in the previous season.
“What was so encouraging about that is it was across the board. Our tenant partners saw increased attendances. The presented events saw increased attendances,” Driscoll said. “So it wasn't just one thing that was working. This felt like the community coming together and saying we want to be in that place. We want to see things in that place. We want to engage in this beautiful jewel of Galesburg.”
The current season isn’t being cut short by the need for repairs. Driscoll said the theater planned to have a gap in programming this summer in anticipation of the repairs being done, with “Into the Woods” being the last scheduled show.
That was also the first time Prairie Players had put a summer musical on at the Orpheum since before the pandemic.
Driscoll said the Orpheum reached a contractual agreement with Prairie Players to rent the Orpheum and put the show on there. He was thrilled about that because he wants the Orpheum to have a larger theatrical presence, and that doesn’t need to come entirely from the Orpheum producing or bringing in shows.
The Prairie Players show ended up with around 1,000 ticketed patrons over three performances.
“Putting in perspective, they seat about a hundred at their venue. So they'd have to do 10 performances to do the same thing they did in this theater,” Driscoll said. “I think that was the community showing up in support of Prairie Players, in support of the performers on stage and the designers and technicians behind stage, and the Orpheum Theatre, all of them showing up to support all of these entities together.”
Driscoll said the Orpheum has a large 2025-2026 season ahead once the repairs are done, including more than 20 shows and events presented by the Orpheum and more than a dozen tenant shows presented by local performing arts organizations.
The upcoming season kicks off Sept. 11 with a concert by country artist Aaron Tippin.
While the theater will be closed to performances until then, the Orpheum will still have a birthday party in August this year as it officially turns 109. Driscoll said fundraising efforts for the theater’s annual birthday party will focus this year on building the Orpheum’s endowment.
“Because one of the things that is very clear, and I don't want to seem negative, we're 109 years old. I think the one thing that we can be assured of is we're going to have more repairs that this place needs,” Driscoll said. “If we can grow our endowment to a place that can support the preservation of this cultural entity year after year, then that is a very firm foundation both structurally and financially for the organization to be in.”
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