The History of 22 Pleasant Street
The building that is now known as the Chester Playhouse was built in 1938 and operated as the Kenerik movie house for many years. Starting in 1963, it was used as a venue for annual summer theatre productions by the Chester Jesters, but then sat unused until 1975 when it was purchased by Leo and Dora Velleman and Canadian Puppet Festivals. They used the building until merging with Mermaid Theatre in 1983.
Then after a brief dormant period, the Chester Theatre Council brought the Playhouse to life again with the first Chester Summer Festival in 1987, a series of touring shows over an eight-week period. That fall the building was purchased by Sir Christopher Ondaatje and renamed the Chester Playhouse. In 1992, he donated the Playhouse to the Chester Theatre Council, a registered charity with a volunteer Board of Directors that continues to operate the Playhouse today.
The Chester Playhouse now showcases established and emerging musicians, professional theatre, Hollywood, and independent films, and welcomes community talent to the stage.
Milestones: 80 Years of Community
The Playhouse was originally built by Ken Corkum and Erik Redden as a movie theatre named Kenerik.
The Chester Theatre Council (CTC) was founded in 1984 to preserve the Leading Wind Theatre as a performing arts centre for the municipality of Chester.
The mission of the Chester Theatre Council in 1984 was to “foster, promote, encourage and develop the performing arts and to maintain a community arts facility within the Municipality of Chester”.
The building lay idle until 1987 when the Chester Theatre Council presented its first Chester Summer Festival production in July of that year, “Side By Side By Sondheim”. Thus began the tradition of presenting quality musicals and drama to our residents and summer visitors. In the fall of 1987, the building was purchased by Sir Christopher Ondaatje and renamed the Chester Playhouse.
To increase the seating in the Playhouse permanent seats were added to the balcony bringing the capacity of the house to 176 seats.
The renovation project was completed in 2005 with the replacement of the original Box Office, an upgraded entry lobby, new washrooms, carpeting and a small art gallery.
The Chester Playhouse celebrated its Ruby Jubilee with its 80th anniversary of entertainment featuring Music, Theatre and Film in the Playhouse. Through the continued support of ticket patrons, donors, sponsors, advertisers, volunteers, and government funders, we promised to build upon the rich history of the Playhouse and attract the finest musicians and actors from our region and beyond, entertain our patrons and provide learning and performing opportunities for youth.
By 2020, the Playhouse needed critical structural work to meet the expectations and needs of audience members, performing artists and the community.
We are pleased to share that the three levels of government – the Municipality of Chester, The Province of Nova Scotia, and the Government of Canada – agree The Chester Playhouse is vital to the cultural, social, and economic health of the community and collectively invested $803,000 in the restoration of the Playhouse!
Equally important, the Restoration Project included donations from over 150 private donors from across our community, who contributed over $450,000 to this project. The restored Playhouse will be more accessible, will be comfortable year-round and will be equipped with the technical equipment required to proudly showcase music, theatre, film and community programs.
On June 11, 2021, weeks away from the completion of the Restoration Project, fire struck this beloved building, causing extensive damage to the roof and performance space. Thankfully, no one was hurt, and we remain grateful to the 18 fire departments from across the province that came together and worked so bravely to extinguish the fire with minimal damage to neighbouring buildings.
Suddenly without a venue, our team quickly reimagined our summer programming, to present incredible live performances outside and in venues around the Village of Chester. We are committed to seizing the opportunity afforded by our Playhouse Without Walls to bring incredible live performances to people across our municipality, as we work to rebuild our beloved venue.
The Rebuild Project officially started in the Spring of 2022 and we really started to see progress as the summer began.
Work continued throughout 2022 and into 2023. We are excited by the progress and are thrilled to announce a tentative Re-Opening date of late summer 2023!
Your new Playhouse will be better than ever, with our team working hard to seize opportunities to make the building greener, more accessible, and better equipped than ever to meet the needs of today’s artists and audiences.
We thank our Rebuild Project Donors and all three levels of Government for their financial support which has allowed us to rebuild and will see the playhouse rise once again.
You can follow the progress of the Rebuild Project here!