Live theater left out

The California Department of Public Health is saying that live performances cannot happen indoors until the county has passed through all the color-coded tiers, leaving community theater companies frustrated.

Reopening... some businesses -- feeling frustrated that they're left out of loosened restrictions.

Action news now reporter tori apodaca is live at the chico theater company.

Tori, we can go the movies..

Why can't we go see a play?

Well the california department of public is saying that live performances cannot happen indoors until the county has passed through all the color- coded tiers.

And this is leaving theater companies here in chico, frustrated.

Nat po*:*"i'm home again" live theaters are waiting for the day they can return to the stage.

The chico theater company took their final bow indoors on march 15th, 2020.

Take sot mark edson, executive director of chico theater company "and then we kept thinking that we'll be back in three weeks, we'll be back may 1st, we'll be back in july and now it's a year later and we're still not back" some theaters have switched to virtual productions but mark edson from the chico theater company says it's just not the same.

Take sot mark edson "live theater is looking into someones eyes that is really right there in front of you" they have put on some outdoor productions behind their building, but say nothing compares to the atmosphere inside the theater tori standup: and after over a year of being dark they are waiting for the day that they can pull their curtains for live in person shows counties need to be in the orange tier for live performances to happen indoors at 20 percent capactiy and 25 percent in the yellow tier.

But this is not making sense to smaller community theaters.

Take sot "they are lumping theaters like the orthium in san francisco that has 14 hundred seats to our theater that has 200 seats and we don't compare in any way" now, edson spends most of his time in the theater applying for grants and is hopeful to receive some funds from the save our stages act but the loss revenue from being closed has been huge.

Take sot "we were getting up to almost 500,000 dollars in annual revenue and then last year it dropped to 24,000 dollars" as for the energy of being back together in the theater take sot "i'd like to get back to that again."

And the chico theater company is currently in rehearsal for another outdoor show that they are hoping to perform in may.

Live in chico, tori apodaca.

Action news now.

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And theaters are hopeful as james gallagher is pushing for the state to eliminate all covid tiers and is asking counties to decide how to safely reopen.