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TBPAC will take name from Tampa benefactors
By JOHN FLEMING © St. Petersburg Times, published December 7, 2000 TAMPA -- The Off Center Theater of Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center has been renamed the Hinks and Elaine Shimberg Playhouse in recognition of a major gift from a Tampa couple whose involvement with the center goes back to its beginning. The $1-million gift from Mandell "Hinks" Shimberg and Elaine Shimberg established an endowment that will support activities such as new plays, artist-in-residence programs and emerging artists in the smallest of the center's four theaters. "It is a space that is very reminiscent of the kind of Off-Broadway theater where a lot of great plays get their start," said Mr. Shimberg, citing last year's Pulitzer Prize winner for drama, Wit. A production of that play recently completed a run at the Off Center. Mr. Shimberg is a real estate developer, past chairman of the TBPAC board and sometime investor in New York and London theater. In fact, he was a producer of the first show ever to play the performing arts center when it opened in 1987. Teddy and Alice, a musical about Theodore Roosevelt, went on to have a short run on Broadway. Two other shows in which he invested -- A Life and Starmites -- were nominated for Tony Awards. Mrs. Shimberg is the author of 17 books, mainly on medical and family issues. After the 130-seat Off Center opened in 1994, it presented a steady diet of performance artists, poets, alternative music, improv groups and other non-commercial acts under its founding artistic director Wendy Leigh. Lately, the theater has become somewhat more mainstream in its approach, and Wit was one of its most successful productions. Shimberg and his wife are regular attendees of the touring musicals that play TBPAC, and he has invested in several of the center's cabaret shows, such as Forever Plaid. But he sees the theater that will bear his name as primarily a venue for straight theater. "Musicals are great, and we love the Broadway series, but what Tampa theater could really use now is a little more drama," he said.
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From the wire |
