Re-Opening Night

On Saturday night Southern California will get a new look at an old friend. The flags are out, the deep-blue carpet is laid and the salmon-colored walls are painted. The props are organized, the actors have gone over their lines one last time, the chime to summon patrons to their seats has been hung with care, and soon the hand-painted curtain will go up once again. Actors and actresses will be back on the boards at the Pasadena Playhouse.

The playhouse, opened at its present location in 1925, has been home to dreams and nightmares. Regulars on today’s television and movie screens got their start in the 700-seat theater on El Molino Avenue. But the theater had hard times in the 1960s, and has staged no plays in 20 years.

Now, thanks to developer David Houk and others, the Pasadena Playhouse is back in business, albeit in a far more competitive Southern California theater environment than the one on which it closed its doors. It is a rich environment, made richer with the return of one of its landmarks.

Renovation is still under way, but not so that you’ll notice out front. The main auditorium is a grand throwback to the days of plush seats and mission-style elegance.

The first play of the revitalized playhouse is George Bernard Shaw’s “Arms and the Man.” In part, artistic director Jessica Myerson says, that’s because Shaw is timeless, classic theater. But it’s also because “we wanted a play that fit with the look of the theater for the first show,” Myerson told us. “In a sense it’s also the theater that we’re showing off.” Then, too, one must honor history; “Arms and the Man” opened a Shaw festival that the playhouse staged the first summer after it had been given the honorary title of the State Theater of California in 1937.

Some Pasadenans insist that the ghost of Pasadena Playhouse founder Gilmor Brown hovers in secret passages in the far reaches of the old theater building. If that’s so, there should be one happy ghost this weekend.