Theatrical Groups Covet Old Theater : Redevelopment: City agency wants an arts organization to run the now-closed Balboa so that renovations can begin. There are several candidates.

The Balboa Theatre, dormant since 1986, has become the focus of renewed discussion among civic leaders and arts officials, who hope to renovate and reopen the 68-year-old theater as the final link in the redevelopment of Horton Plaza.

David Allsbrook, projects manager for Centre City Development Corp., said last week that he is discussing the idea with arts groups, one of which may be chosen to manage the theater.

The arrangement, officials said, would be similar to one between the San Diego Symphony and the old Fox Theatre, which was renovated and renamed Copley Symphony Hall, with the symphony as primary tenants and full-time overseers.

Another possible manager would be the city’s San Diego Concourse, which oversees the Civic Theatre, Golden Hall and Plaza Hall. Donald Telford, concourse general manager, said the city “desperately” needs another booking house.

A reopened Balboa, with its 1,500 seats and prized acoustics, “would be very helpful to downtown San Diego,” Telford said. “It would be a great venue for many different types of events.” The theater is at the corner of E Street and 4th Avenue.

Telford said discussions with Allsbrook have been “very preliminary, but, if we became sole manager, it would end up like the Civic, wherein we would act as landlord and rent it out to a variety of users.”

“We could use it right now,” he said. “There are so many shows that just can’t play San Diego because we don’t have dates available (at the Civic). Our first open date is June. Otherwise, we’re booked every single night, which is great, but we lose a lot of shows.”

Other arts groups have expressed interest in running the Balboa, including La Jolla Playhouse, Pasadena Playhouse, Starlight Musical Theatre and the Visual Arts Foundation of San Diego.

The intent would be to use the theater as a producing--rather than a booking--venue, much in the way the San Diego Repertory Theatre manages the Lyceum theaters at Horton Plaza.

The difference in this case, Allsbrook said, is that whoever runs the city-owned Balboa would shoulder all operating expenses.

“When we entered into the agreement with the Rep, we paid them a management fee,” he said. “Now, we’re paying extra expenses for the maintenance and operation (of the Lyceum theater complex). It’s on the order of $380,000 a year, and the city pays it.

“We don’t want to get into that again.”

Before an operator is chosen, however, CCDC and the city must restore the theater, which was being used as a movie house when it closed 5 1/2 years ago. The building is considered structurally unfit, incapable of withstanding a major earthquake.

A 1988 study commissioned by CCDC put renovation costs at $11 million; more optimistic estimates run to at least $5 million.

“The fault lies in structural strengthening,” Allsbrook told The Times in 1990. “It’s packed with this hollow clay tile. It has a post-and-beam concrete construction, and is very, very rigid. It simply does not comply with modern earthquake standards. It doesn’t give at all, so with any substantial quake, you could have a major disaster.”

Allsbrook said city funds to restore the theater exist and are gathering interest in CCDC coffers. Once an operator is selected, CCDC will pay for restoration, after City Council approval.

Concourse general manager Telford said the Balboa is attractive because of its “can’t-be-beat” location and the fact that its 1,500 seats would be “a nice complement” to the 3,000-seat Civic Theatre.

He said an “intimate” play, such as the Tony Award-winning “M. Butterfly,” which recently played the Civic Theatre, “loses something in such a large space.”

Telford said the lack of dates at the Civic has caused other shows, such as the Tony Award-winning “Tru,” Robert Morse’s one-man performance as writer Truman Capote, to abandon San Diego altogether.

“Can you imagine jazz in (the Balboa), and all the touring plays and musicals,” Telford said. “There’s so much potential to it.”

But Des McAnuff, artistic director of the La Jolla Playhouse, who has toured the Balboa as a possible venue for his company, said he hopes that, regardless of who ends up running the theater, it serves as something besides a booking center.

“The Balboa is a gorgeous theater,” McAnuff said. “But it would be nice to see it operate as a producing house, as opposed to a rental house. After all, we’re a producing town.”

Bud Franks, executive director of Starlight Musical Theatre, said his company has pursued the Balboa enthusiastically and continues to covet it.

“We feel it’s an excellent place for us to perform a winter season of the types of shows that are not often seen in San Diego--primarily, the small-sized musicals,” Franks said. “Given the renovation, the house would be a wonderful place for dance and small theatrical companies.

“We feel we’re the best suited to do what they’re talking about. We have a huge subscription base of more than 14,000 subscribers and a healthy cash reserve. So we remain very interested.”

McAnuff said he has met with CCDC’s Allsbrook, but the subject of managing the theater has never been formally broached to the La Jolla Playhouse board.

“As a citizen of San Diego, I’m interested in the preservation of the theater,” he said. “These 1,500-seat theaters are rare animals.”

McAnuff said the Playhouse has long considered going to a year-round schedule, which it can’t do now because it shares two theaters with UC San Diego, where its performing complex is located.

He said the company has plans to open a third theater on the UCSD campus, “and, when that happens, I would expect us to be open virtually year-round.”

Even so, “We would like to develop a presence off campus,” McAnuff said. “We’d like to do it somewhere in the county, and downtown would be terrific.”

City officials say several out-of-town groups are interested in the Balboa, including the Pasadena Playhouse, which is currently staging the Broadway-bound play, “Solitary Confinement,” at the Spreckels Theatre downtown.

David Houk, owner of the Pasadena Playhouse, said he has met with city and CCDC officials and remains “very interested.” Houk said part of his company’s master plan is to expand into other cities.

“We’re very happy with the experience of ‘Solitary Confinement’ at the Spreckels, which was a kind of test,” Houk said. “We’re very interested in doing more in San Diego. We’ve had discussions on several fronts, and we’re pursuing it actively. I’m torn at the moment about where and when we might (open a local theater), but we are very interested.”

Andy Friedenberg, executive director of the Visual Arts Foundation and the Cinema Society of San Diego, said his group envisions the Balboa as a full-time movie center and cinematic museum.

“It was built as a movie theater, and we want to turn it into a movie theater again,” he said. “We want to create a San Diego Cinematheque that’s a cinema center for all San Diegans, that would join the family of Cinematheques around the world. We want to create a state-of-the-art cinema center.”

The Balboa opened in the mid-1920s as a vaudeville house. In the 1930s, it was converted to a movie palace. It was purchased by the city in 1985.