Exactly twenty years ago, when attorney and founder James Levin moved the fledgling Cleveland Public Theatre to its current home at the corner of West 65th and Detroit Avenue, most people thought he was out of his mind. Even those of us who understood his passion felt the area was crime-ridden and too far away from the Playhouse Square or east side theatre districts. But steadily, real estate acquisition tracked along with his expanding vision. Now, Levin is announcing a change in his role away from the day-to-day operation of the CPT complex. He's taking on the most ambitious project of his career: raising $6.5 million for The Arcadia Project, an enterprising arts and learning campus and “idyllic place for art and culture,” right in the heart of the mean streets that could potentially be one of Cleveland's most promising neighborhoods.

Cool Cleveland: Talk about how CPT has generated economic development in the Detroit Shoreway neighborhood. What was Detroit & W. 65th like when you first moved here?
James Levin: It was March of 1984. Detroit Avenue was marked by boarded-up store fronts, quite a few vacancies, and not many things that would attract consumers, or anyone from outside the area. On the first floor in our space was The White Elephant, a company that bought used furniture and kitchenware from motels and hotels that went out of business around the Midwest, and they used what is now the Gordon Square Theatre to store kitchenware and box springs. There were seven or eight spaces [in the current Theatre] that were used for cold storage and a company that did “alterations on vehicles.” I think I represented all of them [as an attorney] - they were arrested for diverting electrical power from a telephone line. What you have to remember that's unique about CPT is that it’s the only theatre in America where the first members were criminal defendants of mine. Everything that was done in the Theatre was done in exchange for legal services. Building work, electrical work, stage set building…

They were called the Brew Crew? Who gave them that name?
They gave themselves that name. They heard about The Stage Crew, The Technical Crew, so they named themselves the Brew Crew. That whole area was so different. The apartment building at West 64th and Detroit, purchased 5 years ago by Detroit Shoreway Development Corporation was a den for criminals. They’ve now stripped the façade and exposed a very beautiful building. There was more street violence back then: thievery, vandalism, prostitution and drug dealing. There was exponentially more crime and violence than there is now. For about seven to eight years, I made a deal with the drug dealers to get them to move down the street - I hear they moved to the high 80s. In the old days, when we had African-American performers or gay performers, there would be harassment at the City Grille [across the street], now they go out of their way to appeal to the cast, the crew, the theatergoers.

But the good thing is, they haven’t gentrified, they haven’t changed that much. They have the same jukebox and the same crowd.
Yeah. But there are still some great vacancies in the area. The Liberty Bank Building is a great space. I can’t believe a coffee shop can’t move in there. There’s a theatre that may move in across the street.

Talk about your vision for The Arcadia Project.
As you know, for 20 years I’ve been seeking capital money to actualize this vision of a West Side Art Campus in the Detroit Shoreway area. It has been in the middle of the priority list. After the production meeting, after the fundraising meeting, I’d finally get to the capital project. Over the next two to three years, I need to step away from the day-to-day operation of the theatre to secure the renovation of the second floor theatre, and the Gordon Square Theatre to secure funding for acquisition of the church property, which is comprised of three buildings. I recently got some good news from [Cleveland City Councilman] Matt Zone. The city will buy the parking lot between CPT and the church buildings and turn it into a city parking lot, which has been part of Detroit Shoreway’s master plan for years. It’s key because the State wants to know what kind of a commitment the City is making.

What will this do for the City of Cleveland and our region?
I’m convinced that the stretch from West 54th with WSEM [West Side Ecumenical Ministry] to West 69th will become a terrific cultural center, and eventually a tourist attraction. Cleveland needs to celebrate and affirm what is really unique and genuine about Cleveland. When you go to Chicago, you do the one-day of tourist attractions: the Pier, a Cubs game. But the rest of the time you go to the neighborhoods where there’s a gallery or bookshop, 'cause that’s where the real city lives.

How do you think Cleveland should be marketed?

If the city can sell Detroit Shoreway, Tremont and Collinwood as the authentic Cleveland experiences, then its dividends will be that people will come to see and breathe what Cleveland really is. The Growth Association has to quit selling Cleveland as this “rock and roll capital.” And I love the Rock Hall, I just went there with my 7-year old son and we had a great time. There seems to be a lack of trust or awareness of what the real value of Cleveland is. There seems to be a lot of turnover right now in a lot of these organizations, so maybe we’ll see some real change.

What else can be done?
Cindy Barber [co-owner of the Beachland Ballroom in North Collinwood] and I are going to collaborate on an Acoustic Music Festival.

What are your plans for a CPT Campus? Talk about your name for it?
As you know from our little “Pan” mascot, I'm sort of fond of these Greek icons. Do you remember Arcadia from the ancient Greeks?

Wasn’t it sort of a sylvan glade...
It was a very pleasant place up in the mountains that was never invaded during the Peloponnesian War; an idyllic place for art and culture. I like the idea of its protectiveness and its nurturing qualities for artists. The idea is not just one or two buildings where performances take place, but five buildings, outdoors spaces, rehearsal spaces, where grass roots and newer works by accomplished artists and where all kinds of cross pollination and combustion can take place. What happens when a youth theatre meets a [Polish performance artist] Zygmunt Pio Trowski? I’m convinced that wonderful things can happen.

You’re sort of going against the grain with your new capital campaign, announcing it so soon.
I was at the City Club today and ran into a friend of mine who just ran a capital campaign. I told him about us trying to raise money, and he said, “So your quiet period is over, how much more do you need to raise?” And I said, what quiet period? We’re looking for $6 million, but so far we’ve raised $1,000!

How can you be so idealistic in such a cynical time as ours?
I am optimistic that we’ve hit rock bottom and that the Republican hold in Washington is going to thaw. Doesn’t it look that way? Everyone’s mocking [presumptive Democratic Presidential nominee John] Kerry for not saying anything, but the Republican machine is in self-immolation mode. I think we might be on the verge of a new era. I was disappointed that Issue 31 [for local public arts funding] failed, but it was very close. I can’t tell you how many people came up to me to talk about the arts. There’s much more awareness now. The County has a small but symbolic program to give away $300K that’s never happened. They just got the State to reclassify this region so that the County needs to be over 500,000 population rather than the City, so they can tax themselves. We’re not there, but we’re getting there, so I’m either an optimist or a fool.

Besides real estate, you’ve been able to tap into non-traditional funding sources to augment traditional arts funding. Talk about some of those strategies.
We’ve had contracts for education programming with the City of Cleveland, Board of Education, and Cuyahoga Metropolitan Housing Authority. We’ve been successful in negotiating some funds from the State’s Biennial Fund for Capital Projects. For a long time, we had a contract with Cablevision to provide cable TV programming [a cable channel known as CPTV] that expired when Adelphia bought them.

Does the City or the State listen to you with respect, or have they turned a deaf ear to your efforts to develop your neighborhood?
I’ve found that references to urban blight and the plight of artists, or our educational programming, do not elicit the warm and fuzzies in Columbus. But when we reference commerce, economic activity and jobs, we seem to be hitting the right notes. Remember that Bob Taft was singing about job creation - I have to admit that the Republican delegation from Northeast Ohio has been extremely responsive to our capital projects, people like Jim Trakas and Sally Conway Kilbane. And the Democrats as well.

Describe your new role at CPT.
I’ll be the Director of the Arcadia Project for CPT’s Future. Finding the money for the capital campaign, supervising the actualization of the campaign, working with architects and contractors to make it happen. In a secondary way, by agreement with [Producing Artistic Director] Randy [Rollison], I’ll be continuing to direct the Y-Haven project, which is a program near and dear to me. It began about 5 years ago working with men in transitional housing shelters in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction. It’s a four to six month project that creates a new artistic work relative to their issues that opens at CPT in the fall, and then tours to homeless shelters, inner city churches, and drug treatment centers, I’ll also be working on the Box Series, where we open up the theatre and give it to emerging artists from the region and from all over, because there must be some kid at Oberlin or Baldwin-Wallace who’s brilliant and needs some resources and a venue. That kind of grass roots connectedness to the artist is something I want to make sure remains at CPT; as we become more professional and polished, I want to make sure we maintain that.

You’re entering a new phase of your life. Why are you making this change at this time?
There are many reasons, I’ve been recently diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome, and I don’t know if I believe it or not. But the stress of dealing with the theatre’s financial matters and budgets is something I really need a break from. Remember, I took a sabbatical in 1995/6 and I came back feeling very renewed, rekindled. I’m a little tired right now. Also I was 50 this year, so I think if I’m going to accept some new possibilities, new challenges, this is a good time.

This is the way you relax? By taking on more work? By trying to raise $6 million?
Part of it is the frustration of these things not getting done. Rather than the usual juggling of 12 balls in the air, it will allow me to focus on one project. I like that it’s fraught with risk. The singularity of it is more appealing to me than the dodging of the day-to-day.

You’ve always managed to stay ahead of your own curve, by changing your personal role and surrounding yourself with people of various skill sets. How do you manage to do this when so many others get locked in to a static vision of themselves? It’s been extremely synchronistic. I’ve been open to others’ ideas and energy and sometimes genius, whose works have often coalesced with mine, and oftentimes it felt right to pass off the baton. The Performance Art Festival was a perfect example, where I had a vague general idea of an event that I wanted to do at CPT, but your genius took the baton, and there was no reason for me to continue. Randy has been that way as well. His vision and understanding has really blossomed, so rather than retaining my title, let him run with it, and I can move on to the bigger picture. I’m hoping to find someone with that spark for the Arcadia Project. Then I can go out to a pasture and die.

CPT has managed to be one of Cleveland’s most consistently successful theatres while adhering to strictly avant-garde programming. Many other avant-garde institutions only last a few years, at most. What is your secret?
I would dispute the premise. I think a lot of the work we put on stage is a lot more commercially viable that one might think! We did Mrs. Cratchit’s Wild Christmas Binge over the holiday, and that was commercial. Great Lakes Theatre Festival had proven that Christmas fare is successful in this town. [Cratchit playwright] Christopher Durang is very popular, so at first blush it may seem avant-garde, but really it’s not.

How have you developed an audience for the avant-garde in a town that is known for its conservatism and risk-averse culture?
It’s been an ever so slow educating of the theatre-going community. People were dipping their toes with Oscar Wilde but it’s taken a very long time to recognize that we’re not in Sandusky, we’re only 5 minutes from downtown Cleveland - and that the space is the coolest performance venue in Cleveland, without a doubt. It’s flexible, it’s majestic, and it’s very Cleveland, with exposed brick, it resonates cool Cleveland. It has taken time for people to realize that it’s not scary, and that the art is great, to the degree that even their kids will think they are cool. We’re just turning the corner now - we’re selling out Nickel and Dimed every night.

Interview and photos by Thomas Mulready

Nickel and Dimed; On (Not) Getting By In America has been selling out, and has just been extended through 6/6 in the majestic Gordon Square Theatre. Also, catch the provocative Dojoji playing through 6/5 at Cleveland Public Theatre’s Upstairs Theatre, 6415 Detroit Avenue. Call 631-2727 or visit http://www.CPTonline.org for tickets. (:divend:)