Kat, I'm languishing in the US equivalent of "outer Siberia" mundanely known as southern New Mexico.

The theatre was purchased by a couple of local business folks and essentially donated to the community. It had been a mish-mash of little shops and stuff for years. Some idiot plastered over a marvelous facade - rendering it incredibly ugly. We are at the point of getting a demolition crew inside to finish gutting it - then we can start the repair work. We'll probably go to the local high school art/pottery classes and ask them to try to duplicate the tile work as a class project.

We do have a fair amount of funding - some from the state level, if I'm not mistaken, in the form of an outright grant and some matching funds, but it's not going to be enough to complete the place. And it's in no shape for performances yet. One of the local fund raisers has been thru a performance at one of our other theatres coupled with a reception at one of the better restaurants in town. That didn't do too badly - but again just a drop in the bucket to what's still needed.