Hayes Tells of Plans for Theater
Eighty years ago, 9-year-old Helen Hayes made her Broadway debut. This week, the grande dame of American actresses celebrated the rebirth of a theater on a very different Broadway--in this Hudson River town.
Hayes welcomed friends to a twilight fete Wednesday at her Victorian river mansion 30 miles north of the Great White Way.
She told more than 100 friends, including actors Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Colleen Dewhurst and Jose Ferrer, about what she calls the “little theater” that will be her 90th birthday gift in October. It’s a turn-of-the-century silent movie house that’s being renovated into a $5-million arts center in her name.
“This theater was born the same year I was, and I think it will outlive me,” Hayes said.
The 500-seat Helen Hayes-Tappan Zee Performing Arts Center, to open in 1991, is to offer theater, children’s events, music and film.
The new playhouse will get the children “off the streets and away from movies about murder and mayhem,” Hayes said.
So far, more than $1 million has been raised.
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