The Classics Performed Before Folding Chairs

1940S ETHOS
Left, a dress rehearsal of Mile Square Theater’s production of “The Comedy of Errors” at the Monroe Arts Center.

Right, exterior of the center.

By CARLA BARANAUCKAS
Published:
October 3, 2008

THE artistic director of Mile Square Theater in Hoboken, Chris O’Connor, isn’t at the point of saying, “No worries.”

But his list of worries has been shortened, at least for the moment, with the regional theater company’s production of Shakespeare’s “Comedy of Errors,” with performances Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays through Oct. 12. Crossed off his list are concerns about bad weather, airplanes flying overhead or loud blasts from passing cruise ships — things that have interrupted Mile Square’s outdoor performances on the waterfront in Hoboken in recent years.

The Monroe Arts Center, which the Mile Square Theater in Hoboken calls home.

With its new home at the Monroe Center for the Arts in Hoboken, the theater company has found that a roof and four walls cut the environmental distractions to a minimum. O.K., Mr. O’Connor admitted, there was one Saturday night in which theatergoers on the second floor of the center could hear loud music from a comedy show on the first floor. But a word to the organizers of the comedy show brought a quick lowering of the volume.

Started in 2003, Mile Square Theater has focused on works rooted in the classics in part because many of its performances were outdoors, Mr. O’Connor said. “When you perform outdoors you need a highly stylized production to keep the audience’s attention,” something for which the classics are well suited, he said.

That approach has not changed indoors, where the company is using a space set up with about 100 folding chairs on risers. This production of “Comedy of Errors” is infused with a 1940s ethos — from the costumes to the jazzy musical interludes.

The move has taken Mr. O’Connor, who teaches in the theater program at Rutgers University’s Mason Gross School of the Arts, another step toward his dream of making Mile Square a superior regional theater company.

It has also taken Mile Square into a larger, though somewhat precarious, arts community. Monroe Center, two five-story former factory buildings, is home to artists, dancers, musicians and photographers, as well as some small incubator businesses that have a creative spirit to them, said Barry Campbell, director of facilities. The ground floor, which is still largely under renovation, is set aside for retail businesses. The Cheese Store, which sells artisanal cheeses, sandwiches and gift baskets, has been a tenant for 14 months, said Chung Park, the shop’s owner.

A large poster on the center’s main floor shows development plans for what Mr. Campbell calls a transit village on the Monroe Center’s five-and-a-half-acre site, adjacent to the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail station at Ninth Street. Plans call for the arts center to become the focal point of a large residential complex.

The developers of the Monroe Center, who bought the property in 1989, want to bring gentrification to West Hoboken without forcing artists to move out, Mr. Campbell said.

Dil Hoda and Gerry Saddel, the developers, wrote in Real Estate Weekly in August 2005: “Our development paradigm is based on the belief that artists and creative thinkers positively contribute to a community and help create that community’s sense of place.”

The project has progressed slowly. One brochure indicated that the first residential tower would be completed in spring 2006. But construction has yet to begin. Mr. Campbell said that once construction began, if there were no additional delays, it would take 18 to 24 months to complete the first tower.

On Aug. 12, Monroe Center Management filed for protection from creditors in United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey. According to documents filed with the court by Monroe Center’s mortgage holder, Principal Commercial Funding, the center defaulted on a $21 million mortgage. Principal Commercial Funding began foreclosure proceedings in New Jersey Superior Court in April and filed a petition with the bankruptcy court seeking to have all rents from tenants of the Monroe Center paid directly to Principal.

According to Mr. Hoda, the Monroe Center development encompasses five or six business entities, and only two of them are involved in the bankruptcy court filing. “Within the next 30 days we’ll file a plan, and that will basically spell out how we intend to come out from under the court protection and out of the Chapter 11,” he said. “And we have every intention of coming out of Chapter 11 and continuing what we’re doing here.”

Mr. O’Connor is aware of the difficulties facing the arts center, but is staying focused on his theater company. Its next production will be “Santaland Diaries,” the comedy by David Sedaris, in December.

“They’ve been great supporters of ours and we’re grateful to have a home there,” Mr. O’Connor said of Monroe Center’s management. “Through all this we’re proceeding one show at a time and working to bring our audience over there. I do hope they can work all this out, because we hope to remain there.”

“The Comedy of Errors” by William Shakespeare, Mile Square Theater at Monroe Center Theaterspace, 720 Monroe Street, Hoboken, through Oct. 12. Information: www.milesquaretheatre.org; (201) 208-7809.