Theater for the Handicapped Must Look for New Quarters

Wanted: a new theater space.

The Performing Arts Theatre for the Handicapped will lose its home at 7760 El Camino Real in La Costa, Carlsbad by the end of the month, Bill Levinson, the public relations director for the theater, said this week.

Wells Fargo Bank, which had been allowing the theater to use the space rent-free, has rented it starting April 1.

The organization, founded 10 years ago in Los Angeles by Bob Cole, is designed to bring actors with handicaps into mainstream careers in television, film and theater. Three of its graduates are TV anchorwoman Bree Walker; Jim Troesh, a quadriplegic actor who has appeared in four episodes of “Highway to Heaven,” one of which he scripted with his wife, and Barbara C. Adside, born without legs, who went on to appear in “Night Court,” “Cagney and Lacey” and “Lottery.”

Cole moved the group to San Diego in 1984 following a heart attack.

PATH, which recently completed a successful run of “A Curious Savage,” will use the profits from the show to hire its first paid staff member, Norma-Jean Strickland, one of the actresses in “A Curious Savage,” who will be the company’s full-time business manager.

While PATH’s ultimate goal is to find a new theater, in the meantime it needs to find office and storage space, Levinson said. Meanwhile, it will continue workshops for handicapped actors at the old Lorimar Studio in Los Angeles.