Buzz Worthy | Sarasota Players Theatre officials are confident about ambitious plan

Jeffery Kin was used to running a theater in the middle of an arts district in a congested downtown, surrounded by high-rise buildings and annoyingly heavy traffic. So when he stood in the middle of the vacant property off of Fruitviille Road, he felt as though he were in the middle of the Sahara.

"Don't worry," someone told him. "This is what Lakewood Ranch looked like 20 years ago." Kin is the artistic director of the Players Centre for Performing Arts, which until a few days ago was called the Players Theatre (and commonly but incorrectly called Sarasota Players). If everything goes according to plan, that property on Fruitville will, in about three years, be the home of the Players' new performing arts complex in the new Waterside development on the edge of Lakewood Ranch.

It seems like an overwhelmingly ambitious plan. It involves selling the Players' existing property for about $12.5 million, then leasing it back from the buyer for three years while the new center is built, and raising another $12.5 or so million in the meantime. It also involves designing and opening a performing arts center far from all the other arts places in town, out near Fruitville and Interstate 75, with two performance spaces and a school, and running the existing theater while all that's going on.

The plan has been in the works for about a year and a half, and Kin sounds pretty confident it can all happen.

The current Players Theatre, on Tamiami Trail across from the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, is in two different zones. A developer can build something up to 18 stories tall in the front part, where the parking lot is, and five stories high on the back part, where the theater stands now. Developers and real estate people have told Kin and the Players board that $12.5 million is a realistic price. They may even get $15 million.

It takes years for developers to get all the designing work and permitting done, so whoever buys the property should be happy to lease it back to the Players in the meantime, Kin said.

As for the $25 million capital campaign that the Players announced Monday, the company doesn't need all of that to build the new center. That amount will get

the center built an ensure that is has enough of an endowment to keep the center healthy for the future. Kin said.

It was pretty much imperative that Players move anyway. The roof is leaking, the air conditioning system, which Kin said is as big as the rest of the building, could go at anytime. The technical facilities are inadequate, and patrons complain about the parking, which is becoming more problematic.

Worst of all, Kin said, the current property and building gave the Players no room to grow.

Being in the middle of a densely popular performing arts zone had some advantages, Kin said, but it was mostly because of visibility. People who were going to Van Wezel or other theaters in the area would pass by Players and might decide to give it a try. And it will no doubt be odd for people who have long relationships with the theater to see it gone from its current Tamiami Trail home. Players was founded in 1930 and had several short-term homes, including one in a pharmacy, before it landed on its current property in 1936. It was originally in a building in the front of the property, and then built its current theater in 1936.

But Kin said he took some courage from Manatee Players, who have been thriving in their new performing arts center after leaving their decrepit longtime downtown theater. Kin thinks the new Players Centre will become a destination for people in Sarasota, just as the Manatee Performing Arts Center has for Manatee Players audiences.

"They didn't move into a performing arts district," he said. "They became a performing arts district."

Marty Clear, performing arts writer/columnist, can be reached at 941-708-7919. Follow twitter.com/martinclear.

This story was originally published May 6, 2016 at 6:05 PM with the headline "Buzz Worthy | Sarasota Players Theatre officials are confident about ambitious plan ."