Theater expansion includes museum

The Royalty Theater's owner hopes to buy the building next door and has proposed a Greek-themed museum. The city manager is intrigued.

By EILEEN SCHULTE
© St. Petersburg Times
published January 16, 2002

CLEARWATER -- The owner of the historic Royalty Theater is planning a $2-million expansion and hopes to open the city's first museum.

Socrates Charos, owner of the theater at 405 Cleveland St., met with City Manager Bill Horne Tuesday to discuss his plans, which include turning the 81-year-old facility into a Greek museum by day and maintain its status as a performing arts center with live entertainment by night.

"It looks like a museum; that's what everybody says," Charos said. "That's how we got the idea -- the public gave it to us. We said, maybe that's what we should do."

Over the course of his three years as city manager, Horne said, he has heard residents comment many times about how "unusual" it is that a city with more than 108,000 residents has no art museum.

Horne said Charos' idea is intriguing.

"We intend for him to sit down with our planning director, Cynthia Tarapani, and Margo Walbolt, our cultural affairs manager, and bounce his ideas off them," Horne said.

Charos' plan includes buying the roughly 6,000-square-foot Pat Lokey Building next door to the theater at Cleveland Street and Fort Harrison Avenue. After completing the $460,000 purchase from owners Ron and Angie Chacon of Palm Harbor, Charos plans to combine the two buildings.

When the Mediterranean-style theater was constructed in 1921, its lobby was located where the ground floor of the Pat Lokey Building is now.

"We're trying to put the theater back the way it was," Charos said.

Charos has signed a contract to buy the property and said he has 55 days to put the package together. He said he is obtaining a bank loan to purchase the building and will raise and borrow the rest of the $2-million, which would pay for renovations and artwork.

Ron Chacon, the owner of the Pat Lokey Building, said the transition is proceeding "smoothly."

Chacon's company, Task Management, sells demonstration items that are sold in mall kiosks. "We moved out from L.A. 11/2 years ago. It was going to be more of an administrative building, but the L.A. office had it covered," he said.

Plans call for the removal of 26 seats down the right and left walls of the 434-seat theater to make room for marble tables to hold replicas of famous Greek statues. There will be likenesses of Aristotle, Plato and Socrates, Charos said.

He also plans to exhibit antique musical instruments and, he said, the building will house traveling exhibits of authentic Greek artifacts when a suitable laser security system is installed. Inside the Pat Lokey Building, Clearwater artifacts will be displayed. Upstairs, Charos said, there will be a school for performing artists.

One of the names Charos is considering is the Clearwater Museum and Hellenic Museum of Florida. The museum would be open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, and there would be an admission charge: $5 for adults, $4 for seniors and $3 for students.

He said the money will help the theater, which features concerts by local acts such as N'Elvis, the Elvis impersonator, silent movies and other events, to survive.

"At night, we're doing good," Charos said. "Daytime, (we're) not because we don't have parking. Financially we try to make it, but it's very difficult."

Charos also wants to change the building's facade.

If all goes according to plan, Charos said the museum will open sometime in May.

"Clearwater needs this," he said.

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