Great American Playhouse closes in Oro Valley

The closing came a week before the theater was to open its holiday show “Planes, Trains & Sleigh Bells.” Its final production, “Whodunit or They Haven’t a Clue,” was set to run through Saturday, Nov. 14, and “Planes” was to open the following weekend.

Great American Playhouse artistic director Sean MacArthur, who ran the theater with Nancy LaViola, said they were locked out of the building Monday night after they and NAI Horizon, which manages the property for Scottsdale-based owner WCCP Rancho Vistoso LLC, were unable to reach an agreement on lease payments. MacArthur said the theater had been paying reduced lease payments under an agreement with the previous landlord, but the new landlords weren’t willing to work with them when they bought the property in August.

“We were slowly and successfully building an audience and we had a loyal following in Oro Valley that was continuing to grow,” he said.

Great American Playhouse was in the Rancho Vistoso Center, an 84,000-square-foot shopping center at 12925-13005 N. Oracle Road. The plaza was sold at auction last August to WCCP, which also has operations in California.

Theater employees and actors were not aware of the closing until Sunday night, when LaViola and MacArthur met with them at the end of the final performance, said actor Jesus Limon.

“As far as the actors and wait staff and people who worked in the kitchen, none of us knew this was coming,” said Limon, 42, who has performed in every Playhouse production since it opened in summer 2013.

Limon said workers, including the 14 actors cast for “Whodunnit,” were paid their final checks on Sunday night.

LaViola has said that it cost nearly $1 million to open the 9,000-square-foot space at 13005 N. Oracle Road, converting it from a supermarket — formerly Ike’s Farmer’s Market — into a theater.

The theater opened in August 2013 and mounted melodramatic productions — plays with silly, over-the-top storylines and equally over-the-top acting. The theater gave guests free popcorn and served a simple menu of custom pizzas, sandwiches and other snack foods.

Oro Valley Mayor Satish I. Hiremath, an early supporter of the theater, called the closing a loss for Oro Valley’s arts community.

“It’s very unfortunate,” he said. “I thought they lent a different type of arts and culture to our community.”