Don’t let the doors close on that small arts group in your Chicago neighborhood

“Port of Entry” is an immersive theater experience in a renovated 1929 warehouse by the Albany Park Theater Project and Third Rail Projects. Theaters and arts venues, big and small, have struggled since the pandemic hit. (Pat Nabong/Sun-Times)

For three decades, I’ve spent my career in the arts waiting for live theater finally to become part of the national discourse, though not in this way: From public radio to national newspapers, the economic crisis facing live theaters is a major topic of conversation.

Here in Chicago, the Sun-Times Editorial Board has called on Mayor Brandon Johnson to convene “the city’s high-powered movers and shakers, major cultural players, theater companies, and funders” to figure out a strategy to counteract the very real threat to Chicago’s theater community.