Cultural Leaders
Barbara Stein
Executive Producing Director at Actors’ Playhouse
Barbara Stein is the co-founder and executive producing director at Actors’ Playhouse. Initially opened almost 35 years ago in South Dade, the professional regional theater company moved to its iconic Miracle Mile location 28 years ago. Stein and her husband Lawrence – also a co-founder – have dedicated their lives to enriching the community with over 200 plays and musicals since then, with no signs of stopping. This upcoming season features five different productions in addition to four children’s plays. The full schedule is available at actorsplayhouse.org, where you can also become a season subscriber.
What is the mission of Actors’ Playhouse at Miracle Theatre?
To serve our diverse community with the highest caliber of dramatic and musical theater. We really like to create awareness and educate people to expand their ideas, horizons, and goals through cultural experiences and live theater events.
What are some highlights of the upcoming season?
We did ‘Million Dollar Quartet’ two years in a row, but this year’s ‘Million Dollar Quartet Christmas,’ is a whole new show. It’s about when Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Johnny Cash got together for the last time at Sun Records, and it was a jam like you wouldn’t believe. It’s going to be a great sendoff to the holiday season. And I look forward to ‘Jimmy Buffett’s Escape to Margaritaville,’ another big, spectacular Broadway musical on our main stage. The opening night of the show, February 3, is the exact day the theater opened in 1988, so we’re having a big street party after the show. Everything we’re doing next season is exciting and different, but the two starters are going to be the highlights of the year.
What do you think of the Gables as a cultural arts center?
It certainly is becoming one, and we were a catalyst for it to happen. Before we partnered with the City of Coral Gables 28 years ago, it was pretty dead downtown. There were no other cultural events. From our resurrection of the downtown area, and serving as the anchor of it, it became a destination for residents, regional people, and even international tourists.
What drives you as an artistic producer?
Just a love of culture and giving back to the community. My husband and I are the founders of Actors’ Playhouse. We were part of a group of organizations that cared about cultural experiences in the community…. I love the impact and benefit [the theater] has on others. I think that people learn a lot about themselves; they learn about tolerance, they learn about other individuals. Young people can come and explore very important issues. They learn something and become better for it. That’s why civilizations are remembered by their cultures, and to be part of that is very important and exciting to me.
Mike Eidson
Founder of Sanctuary of the Arts
Through his nonprofit Sanctuary of the Arts, Inc., Gables attorney and historic preservation advocate Mike Eidson has brought three historic city churches back to life and turned them into centers for the arts, with spaces for performance, galleries, and classrooms. Those churches include two sanctuaries on the campus of the First Church of Christ, Scientist, on the corner of Le Jeune Road and Andalusia Avenue, across the street from City Hall. Now with a new stage, the larger of the two has already seen numerous performances, including the Mainly Mozart series. The third church is St. Mary’s Missionary Baptist Church at 136 Frow Ave., in the MacFarlane Homestead historic district. Eidson saved the 1924 historic building from demolition and restored it for performances and for use by local schools as an educational and rehearsal space.
What is the mission of the Sanctuary of the Arts?
It’s to provide spaces for artists to come create, to talk to each other, and workshop their work and then perform it. We curate our own en- tertainment here. It’s like a Parisian salon at the turn of the century, where you’re discussing issues and mainly concentrating on the arts: poetry, movie, music, a little theater, and dance. We’re trying to provide more opportunities and facilities so kids don’t have to drive 25 miles to go somewhere; they can come right here in downtown Coral Gables.
What are some highlights of the upcoming season?
We’re making it up as we go along, and we’re filling in the schedule now. We really have a tremendous versatility but we’re concentrating on the arts in a way that most people wouldn’t think of. We have visual arts, we have performing arts, we have lectures and poetry. It’s sort of an intellectual center for the cultural arts. This is not just local; it’s international.
What do you think of the Gables as a cultural arts center?
We’re adding to what Coral Gables has, but it needs more, as far as culture is concerned. It needs more venues, it needs more opportuni- ties. [The Sanctuary] is attracting people to Coral Gables, so it will help its reputation in the arts. We have so many people moving here, and there will be things for them to do and be involved in that I think they’ll find interesting. We’ve already had eight first-class classical concerts on this stage alone.
What drives you as an artistic producer?
It’s always been a dream for my wife and I to do this. We wanted to bring the arts to people in a way that [breeds] the creation of more of it and where they can afford to do it. We’re very, very inexpensive. We just want to expose the community to [the arts].
Bari Newport
Producing Artistic Director at Gablestage
Founded in 1979, GableStage has grown exponentially from its roots as the Florida Shakespeare Theatre, putting on Shakespeare plays in the outdoor Casino Gardens at Vizcaya. Now a fixture of the Coral Gables community, GableStage produces six plays a year at its current location in the Biltmore Hotel. It has now won 64 Carbonell Awards and a Ruth Forman Award for major advancements in the South Florida theater scene. Bari Newport has been the producing artistic director at GableStage just since April, but has already been lauded as the perfect replacement for the late, great Joseph Adler, who served over 20 years in the same position. In her short time at GableStage, Newport has been responsible for the creation and continuation of a variety of initiatives, not just on the stage but also in education and community engagement. You can find more information about the theater’s initiatives and upcoming season at gablestage.org.
What is the mission of GableStage?
To confront today’s issues and ideas.
What are some highlights of the upcoming season?
The big show of the season is called ‘El Huracán’ by Charise Castro Smith, who won the Academy Award this past year for the Disney film ‘Encanto.’ Charise grew up here – she grew up performing at GableStage and attending GableStage productions. This will be a local premiere of ‘El Huracán;’ it’s only ever had two other productions and never in Florida. It takes place during Hurricane Andrew 30 years ago, so we wanted to line it up as best we could with the 30th anniversary [in August]. It’s based loosely on Shakespeare’s ‘The Tempest,’ and is being directed by a leading director in Hispanic stories, Dáma- so Rodríguez. He brought me this piece in 2016. It’s really a story of family – an immigrant story that’s funny and feminine and has real magic in it.
What do you think of the Gables as a cultural arts center?
It’s far more than just Coral Gables. We attract audiences from near and far; people as far as Boca Raton are subscribers here who come to every show, but of course, we also have our neighbors who walk to the theater and have for 25 years. Last year, we were able to be one of the only theaters in the country to offer streaming of every single one of our productions so people around the world could become familiar with GableStage. GableStage isn’t just a theater, but a citizen in the community.
What drives you as an artistic producer?
Partly, I’m trying to honor Joe Adler’s memory, who was artistic direc- tor here for over 20 years. And partly, I’m trying to honor GableStage’s really remarkable legacy by giving it a new chapter moving forward.
Brenda Moe
Programming Director at Coral Gables Art Cinema
In 2006, the City of Coral Gables put out an RFP (request for proposal) with the purpose of building an art house. By 2010, the Coral Gables Art Cinema had opened, all at the expense of the city, its businesses and foundations, and its residents. Brenda Moe, now the programming director at Coral Gables Art Cinema, has been involved since the very beginning, serving as executive director for several years before taking on her new role earlier this year.
What is the mission of the Coral Gables Art Cinema?
Our mission is to inspire, engage, and enhance our community through the powerful medium of film.
What are some highlights of the upcoming season?
One thing I’m really excited about is the film “The Good Boss,” which stars Javier Bardem and will be at the cinema starting Sep- tember 2. This film received a record-breaking 20 nominations in the Goya Awards, which are Spain’s Academy Awards. We’re also doing a series called Ozon and the Early Subversives, opening with a film by Francois Ozon, the famous French director. The film is called “Peter von Kant,” and it’s an adaptation of Rainer Fassbinder’s “The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant.” What’s exciting is that we’re doing more layered programming; not just bringing in Ozon’s film but pairing it with Fassbinder’s film and a John Waters film. Those are Ozon’s early influences, so we’ll have his film and then these older titles that allow patrons to see the influences.
What do you think of the Gables as a cultural arts center?
What makes it special is the effort that it has taken in the public and private sector to make this happen. Coral Gables Art Cinema was founded almost 12 years ago along with the museum and Books & Books. This area [Aragon Avenue] is an anchor of culture and com- munity. We saw that especially through the support that we received [during] the pandemic. I know that to be true just because I live it every day and see it in our patrons.
What drives you as an artistic producer?
Serving my community––and that includes everybody. When I say everybody, I think of our Children and Families program. We’re the only film-based organization in Miami that dedicates a portion of our mission to children and families. We need to equalize the opportunity and access to culture, because we know that culture and art have a positive effect on young people… We have a pay-what-you-can ticket price for those programs, so regardless of your income you can come to the cinema. Another group is children with autism spectrum disorder. We have a sensory-friendly program where we show films to people living with autism, and their families. So, it’s not just culture-seekers or cinema buffs – everybody deserves access to art.