Hey, Ho, Way to Go, Ohio

By my house is a wooded area where I do my walking when the weather is good. It’s a nice little amenity my community offers but it does have this one little quirk. It seems like every time I go in there, whether due to blight or bad soil or what I don’t know, another tree has fallen down. That’s how I feel about my beloved downtown theatres, especially the ones I grew up inside and alongside. It seems like all I do lately is talk about another tree fallen. Anyway, I got the memo about the latest one today, and that’s the New Ohio Theatre, and it made me sad. News spread quick, in fact, as I write this, it’s already gotten around via social media and I’ll probably be the last one to comment on it.

Now, my younger friends, seeing the picture above, will say, “THAT’s not the Ohio Theatre!” but of course that’s because it’s the OLD Ohio Theatre, before they moved to Christopher Street in 2011, and the older one is the one I had the strongest connection to. In fact I think I had been in that older Wooster Street space way back in the late ’80s, before the Ohio (a.k.a. Soho Think Tank) even moved in, which was circa 1994. That neighborhood, in the ’80s and early ’90s was the heart of the art scene, i.e. the visual art scene, and one was always prowling around Soho at night going to galleries and openings and loft parties and bars, and performance art was also flourishing. And so any theatres plunked down in that area (there were a few) savored of that art studio/ nightlife atmosphere. I lived not far away in Tribeca in the early years, as I wrote here, and loved that feeling down there, the converted warehouses and industrial spaces, of wrought iron, brick, old paint and the cobblestone streets. Night time was best, because by day Canal Street is insane.

So when Soho Think Tank actually presented a play of mine there in the Ice Factory Festival in 2002 I felt like I had made it to the SHOW, you know, this was one of my first productions in a space that felt vital and happening, in that huge cavernous street-front with its beautiful blonde wooden floors and those big white pillars. I had seen so many amazing things there; I was proud to get my weird little moment there, too. Over the next few years, I had another play presented there in a reading (2006) and participated in other shows and events at the old Ohio. Amazingly, and to my sadness, I have like NO photographic record of any of this; Smartphones with digital cameras didn’t become universal until early in the next decade (although I do have a crappy video of the 2002 show that might come in handy some day.) Oh wait, I do have one photo from the 2002 production, of two of the performers in it, Sarah Jane Bunker and Moira Stone, shown here in the dressing room, half their lifetimes ago, haha! More on that show, Sea of Love, here.

Anyway I was sad when the Ohio moved. It was a definite bellwether of changing times. But I liked the New Ohio Theatre, too. I’ve seen several terrific productions there over the past decade. And will likely go again one last time — my friend Edward Einhorn reports he has a show going up there this summer, one of the last in the space before it closes in late August.

After these many decades Artistic Director Robert Lyons, a mensch of epic proportions (literally, he’s like 6’5″ or something) has earned his freedom. This isn’t retirement, he’s touring Europe with a production of his own. And from what I understand the New Ohio’s current space in the Archive Building will remain a theatre, and the landlord is evaluating proposals for a new tenant. So what’s gone, precisely? I dunno. Feels like part of the firmament.