Editor's note: This is the first in a series
of articles putting the spotlight on a downtown location. This issue
we feature the NeVille Center.
Upcoming plays scheduled at the Neville Center for the Performing
Arts are:
“Quilters”
Nov. 15, 16, 17, 22 & 23
“Once Upon a Mattress”
Feb. 14, 15, 16, 21 and 22
“Flaming Idiots”
April 4, 5, 6, 11 and 12
Call 308-532-8559 to make reservations during the week preceding each
play.
Tickets are also available at the door.
The Neville Center at Fifth
and Bailey in downtown North Platte still makes a spectacular night scene
73 years after it first opened as the Fox Theatre.
Volunteers Save the Neville
A family's generous gift to North Platte and an army of volunteers saved
the historic Fox Theatre for generations to come.
As television offered entertainment at home and large theaters showing several
movies in the same complex took over the entertainment scene, the Fox Theatre
faced the same extinction as many other theaters in the last quarter of
the 20th century.
When the theater closed in 1980,
its future was uncertain. The theater opened Nov. 24, 1929. Keith Neville,
who was governor of Nebraska from 1917-1919, and Alex Beck, both with the
North Platte Realty Company, financed the building of the theater. The theater
is an eclectic collection of architectural designs, with bas relief and
geometric, floral and vine patterns entwined with gargoyles frozen in time.
Opening at the beginning of the Depression, the theater provided an escape
from reality for families through the Depression, World War II, the Korean
War and Vietnam. After 1980, when the theater closed, there was talk of
razing the building for a parking lot.
The descendents of Keith Neville, the four Neville sisters - Irene Bystrom,
Francis Newberry, Virginia Robertson and Mary Nell Sieman - would decide
the building's fate. "I remember the evening they met; Mary Nell's house
was across from me," recalled Patty Birge, a longtime theater supporter.
"Virginia (Robertson) called me within the next couple days and asked what
I thought about using it for a playhouse. We accepted it, of course," Birge
said.
For many years, the community theater group presented plays at the State
Theater on North Jeffers, at schools and the Pawnee Hotel. At last, the
group would have a home of its own. It would be expensive and take a great
deal of hard work and require the community's support, but it could be done.
It would not be easy bringing the theater back to its original beauty. Years
of use had exacted a toll on the building.
One challenge was the orchestra pit. Over the years, it had been filled
with sand and concrete poured over it, Birge said. Once the concrete was
broken up, volunteers hauled the concrete out and removed the sand, wheelbarrow
load by wheelbarrow load. Sometimes volunteers would cook for the other
volunteers, Birge said, whether it was sloppy joes or chocolate-chip cookies.
Sometimes volunteers brought sack lunches. Volunteers worked alongside contractors
each day, Birge added. Whether it was scraping off old paint or gum from
under the theater seats, volunteers showed up to do whatever was needed.
Finally, $250,000 was raised to pay for the work volunteers couldn't do.
The finished product is a true testament to the generosity of the various
contractors and the dedication of volunteers who wanted to make the theater
a reality. Since that first remodeling, additional work has continued to
enhance the theater. The social room, named after Patty Birge, was added,
the marquee has been restored to its original beauty, additional dressing
rooms and kitchen have been built and a costume storage area.. In the last
two years, air conditioning has been added, through the fund-raising efforts
of "Chill the Neville." This has made the theater available for use throughout
the summer months.
The facility is the envy of many theatrical groups, Birge added. Speakers
and performers often stand on stage and look out over the 900-seat auditorium
and praise the grand old facility, not only for its beauty and magnificence,
but also for the community and volunteers who saved the building from becoming
a parking lot. The Neville Center for the Performing Arts is one of several
in North Platte on the Nebraska National Register of Historic Sites.
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