- Will you consider this?

She's a beauty that's been awaiting quite a bit of love for some time.

And she's on the National Register of Historic Places.

Stay here for what's in store for the Madison Theater.

(upbeat guitar music) Since opening in 1920, the Madison has hosted vaudeville, silent movies, major motion pictures, but as with many older structures, she's in need of some restoration.

Cody Giebelhausen and Lee Wenger with the Madison Preservation Association are here to give us an update because it's going to be ongoing.

Welcome.

- [Cody] Thank you.

- [Lee] Thank you, Chris.

- It's kind of fun.

So we have a couple of generations here.

Who are adding to yet another generation.

Who would like to tell me about how this started because Madison Theater has been trying to make a comeback for years, and years, and years, and has suffered even a fire.

- I'd have Cody talk about that because I came into it a little bit later.

So, Cody, you're on.

[Christine] Take it away.

- So, the Madison Theater originally closed in 2003 after a series of theater fires across the country.

And there were some life safety requirements at the theater that just couldn't be met, mostly fire sprinklers.

So, the theater sat for about 19 years now, and various groups have tried over the years to restore the theater, but the roadblock's always been a purchase price and getting the theater bought and into somebody else's hands.

So, after about 15 years, my dad got to an agreeable contract with the Comfort family to purchase the theater and also have part of the property donated to a not-for-profit, which would be formed then.

So, this past January 13th, we raised $1.3 million through investors in the community to purchase part of the property, as well as form the Madison Preservation Association, which is specifically focused on restoring the theater.

It received its 501c3 not-for-profit status from the IRS.

And that group also received the donation of the theater.

So the Madison Preservation Association is now the owner of the Madison Theater.

And after a little bit of fundraising this year, they'll own the entire property as it's right now, split into two parcels.

- Okay, so, you know, I mean, where Rumberger's was, wasn't always a restaurant or anything like that.

That was part of the main lobby or was it?

- Correct.

Yep, that was the outer lobby.

And the marquee used to be attached to that part of the building.

- [Christine] All right.

And then you have to make some other allowances for ADA requirements, correct?

- [Cody] Absolutely.

- Because it was not really accessible unless you had some strong friends.

(chuckles) - [Cody] So, we're fortunate in having almost the entire block.

So, we've got the former Rumberger's Restaurant down through Neon Bison.

What would've been like Adam's Apple, Gin Joint, and Neon Vice, our old Judges Chambers, that was never part of the theater.

So, having that now all integrated into the project allows our elevators to go in that space.

So, we don't have to put the elevators in the theater and take away from, you know, the beauty of that space.

- [Christine] The ambience, right?

- So, the people movements, as we call them.

All the vertical movement's gonna occur outside of that theater space.

And so the project really only works because we have both parts of this block.

- [Christine] Okay, that's wonderful.

- [Lee] And you mentioned ADA, - Right.

which of course is very important, and wasn't in 1920 when that thing was built.

If you'll recall, and many folks watching this, will recall when you went in through the box office, the little box office stand in the open air lobby, you went in, you went actually up an incline to the inner lobby where the candy counter was.

Then you turned left and went down ramps into the theater.

So, it was accidentally ADA compliant, to that extent anyway, a hundred years ago.

- But balcony, not accessible.

- No, no, not so much, as they say.

Not so much.

- So, yeah they couldn't watch the organ.

Well, I don't even know.

Was there an organ in the balcony?

Or was it always like on the stage for the... - It was at the side of the stage.

There's two canopies that you can see in the pictures and there's a plaster grill in underneath the canopies and the organ pipes used to be back there.

They're no longer there.

The organ was sold off in the eighties and we're told it's in a pizza parlor in Vancouver now.

- So are we gonna try to get it back, you think?

Or do you know?

- [Cody] We don't think that one will come back, although there's a variety of organizations that will donate restored organs and the operating cost is incredibly high for them annually.

So, that's something we're still working on.

Do we have a, you know, physical theater organ or an electronic organ?

- [Christine] Right, and is it really necessary for what you've planned?

- It depends who you ask.

- [Christine] There you go, okay.

- It depends on who you ask.

- Fair enough.

All right.

We're we're gonna go all over the place.

But Lee, you said you got involved late in this project.

How come?

- Well, I had no idea that it was in the works.

I didn't know that Cody and his dad and a couple others had already been working on a plan with the Comfort family and with financing options, things like that.

And I think actually I got back from vacation, had a call from his dad and said, "I got a project I'd like to talk to you about.

You wanna come down and meet me at the Madison Theater and let me show you through it?"

That was my first inkling of this iteration.

As Cody mentioned, people have been trying to do this for 20 years.

- [Christine] Well, your dad has been for, I was still in the news business, I think, when he was trying to make it a go.

- And I had just gotten back from vacation with the family and got this call from Jeff, went down and saw it and was extremely excited.

Particularly with the plans that would be able to maybe succeed where the earlier attempts hadn't.

And it has, so far.

- [Christine] Right, right.

Well, you know, I went online and I looked at pictures and you've got a lot of volunteers that are painting and, I mean, that's preservation.

What about restoration?

What all needs to be done?

Is it crumbling ceilings, walls, that kind of thing?

What all needs to happen?

- So there's certainly a significant amount of plaster damage in the theater, but it's considered to be 75 to 80% intact.

And what that means from a plaster perspective, is they could restore that as it was originally built without any pictures or any prior evidence.

There's still so much of it there.

Now, we don't know what the original colors were.

We know it wasn't purple that it is right now.

Probably painted that in the eighties.

But the theater, when it's finished, it will look and feel, you know, much as it did in 1920 when it opened, or probably closer to 1928.

There was a renovation, that's when the organ was added, the stage was changed a little bit.

The rest of the space has been more or less gutted.

The lobby is, the outer lobby, as they call it, is not there anymore.

And that would've been the ramping portion that goes up to now the round kind of rotunda area, which is still in, you know, in beautiful, beautiful being an interesting term their condition is.

- [Christine] It's preserving condition.

- Exactly.

- [Christine] How's that?

- There's been no climate control in the theater for, you know, decades now.

And that space, especially, the paint is peeling, probably very thick lead paint that will have to be abated.

A lot of work there to get that space cleaned up.

- [Christine] But you won't use volunteers for that, obviously.

- [Cody] No.

- [Lee] Nope.

- [Cody] So, the painting that was just done or done some time ago, that was just to get rid of the brown and yellow that was in the restaurant space.

So, we're holding fundraising events and public tours in the space.

And just to neutralize the color a little bit.

Born Paint was very generous and donated the paint for us.

As far as the actual ornamental paint work and the final, you know, restoration, that will be done by local and national contractors that we'll source.

- [Christine] Yeah.

And so you're excited about it because you're a theater person.

- I am, I admit.

- What do you expect?

I mean, again, we're gonna hop back to where Cody was, but what do you expect to see on that stage?

Or what do you expect to perform on that stage?

- Well, as a matter of fact, I bring very few skills to this whole part of the operation, but I would love to produce shows in there.

It was an 1800-seat movie house.

And you may recall, the balcony had half the seats.

It's a gargantuan balcony.

This new iteration of it will have about 1600 seats.

And, I think, probably again, half of 'em will be in the balcony.

The sight lines, and we've been up there, it's, you know, needs to be cleaned up and stuff, but we've been up there.

The sight lines are still wonderful.

That hasn't changed.

So if you sit in the balcony, you sit in the main floor, you're going to be able to see.

Cody has favored the Facebook community with a kind of off the cuff rendition of a song.

I love the acoustics in the room.

And we had just finished with one of the painting things back in the spring.

And I just went in there, just before we left, and I just opened up and sang real loud in the room.

And Cody said, "Hey, hey, could you get up on the stage and do that again?"

So I did.

Well, it turns out on Facebook.

And I had people say that they saw it on Facebook.

Well, the point being, not my wonderful singing, but the fact that the room rings, it still rings.

- [Christine] You could hear it from every spot - [Lee] Every spot.

And there was, I can assure you, no microphone.

(Christine laughs) There was no microphone.

I'm excited about putting live theater in there.

Obviously there's gonna be lots of other things, concerts, and movies, dances, banquets, in cooperation with the restaurant that'll be in the front.

You eat out there or eat in one of the spaces upstairs, which Cody can tell you about later, and then move in there for an entertainment part, and then maybe move back out for cocktails afterwards.

It's an exciting place.

I can't wait to perform in it.

I can't wait to produce things in it.

And it, you know, my dad was an usher in there.

- [Christine] Is that right?

After high school, in the forties.

And I remember seeing movies in there, as I'm sure lots of our viewers do.

The one I distinctly remember, 'cause I loved it so much, was "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea".

- [Christine] Oh, I bet.

- Kirk Douglas, James Mason as the captain.

That, you know, walking up that incline we talked about after you'd gotten your tickets and you walk up the incline.

On the two sides as you walk were the big, oh, they have a name for 'em, the movie panels showing what's coming, coming attractions.

You walk through that forest of wonder up to the second wonder, which was the candy counter, and then went in and took your seat and enjoyed the magic.

Well, I want to be part of bringing the magic back to the Madison.

- [Christine] How about it?

How about it?

Well, you were talking about seating.

So, how bad are the seats?

They all have to kind of be redone, correct?

- Sure, so the seats are not original.

They're not of the period of significance, as we call it.

The era that we wanna take the theater back to, they're also quite narrow by today's standard.

So, the seats will be all new, although in a more historic style.

And they'll be a little bit wider though, a little bit more comfortable for today's standard.

- [Christine] which is why there will be (laughs) well, it's the population.

- [Lee] That's right.

- And you know, I don't know.

I guess they didn't allow for bigger dresses back in the day or maybe they took up two seats, I don't know.

Is there a place within our state that manufactures those types of seats?

Or do you have to look?

- Sure, yeah.

There's several manufacturers of theater seating.

- [Christine] You're so young and I know your dad has been talking about this for years, and years, and years.

How excited are you about preservation and old things like, like us.

(laughs) - How excited are you about us?

- Let's start there.

- So, I mean, for me, this just started as a professional endeavor.

I'm educated as an accountant.

I used to work for John Deere and corporate accounting.

And during Covid I decided that everybody else was making big changes in their life, why didn't I?

So I left corporate and part of the reason that I came back here was to join my dad and his professional endeavor with, you know, restoring the Madison.

And over the last, you know, 24 months now, it's just become a passion project.

And, you know, the, you know, yes, the project is highly complex.

There's many layers to it.

And, you know, the financials, the design, the users, everything.

But at the end of the day, we just wanna see this thing restored for the community.

It's such a unique part of development to work in because the support is overwhelmingly positive.

And frequently, in this industry, that's not the case.

Usually projects are a little more controversial and, you know, hearing all the different reasons that people advocate for seeing... - [Christine] Such as?

We need things downtown.

- So downtown stakeholders, you know, having this entire block, that's blighted at this point between the two largest hotels in this city, it's pretty easy for all the downtown stakeholders to get behind it.

Historic preservationists love it because, you know, it's the last movie palace that we have.

The arts community loves it because we don't have a theater with around 1600 seats, which happens to be just the perfect size for a lot of different arts groups and performers, local groups that will have preferred user fees at this venue because it's a not-for-profit.

So, you know, we'll have a per-seat, buts-in-seats user fee system.

- [Christine] Buts-in-seats.

- Buts-in-seats.

- [Christine] Okay, well, we'll have to make sure that that shows up on, okay, on the screen.

- So for some of the groups that, you know, maybe they don't know if they're gonna sell out and they don't want to spend $5,000 to rent the space for a a Thursday evening.

You know, they might pay, depending what group they are, between $1.50 and $3 per person that walks in.

And if 60 people walk in, then you know, we're a not-for-profit and, and we can afford to do that.

And part of the reason that we can afford to do that is 'cause we have a restaurant in the space that is a tenant to the, not-for-profit, that pays us rent.

So, there's a lot of layers for kind of how the whole thing can work.

Another reason that that people are very excited about it is we're going to be very intentional with how the employment works at the theater.

There's, you know, we've got the federal transitional housing just up the street.

Phoenix House just opened into shelter there.

We've got, you know, certainly Salvation Army, Goodwill has shelters.

Carl Cannon is on our board.

You know, Carl runs ELITE.

And making sure that the areas of our community that need this employment.

The full spectrum of someone's gotta turn the lights on, to someone's gotta book and program shows, and there's all the different, you know, layers of complexities of employment in between, but making sure that those jobs go to people that need them first, and people that are down there and local, and, you know, and then working from there.

- It really is exciting.

So, what can people in the audience do that maybe aren't familiar with what they can contribute to this?

Other than money and a little bit of time, how can anybody get involved?

- So the first thing we need people to see it.

People need to get in there and say, "Wow, this thing is still here.

It's still beautiful."

So, just come on a tour.

Just come check it out.

And I'm 25 years old, the theater closed in 2003.

My parents wouldn't let me go to the concerts there in the late nineties when I was two or three years old.

- [Christine] I know.

They were so strict.

- [Cody] So, I don't have any memories of the theater.

And I think most young people don't, but when you realize what's behind those doors, you realize, you know, wow, you can relate to maybe, you know, what Lee might remember of going to movies there, or at least have a desire to be able to experience that for yourself again and get very excited about it.

So, the easiest thing is just come check it out, tell your friends about it, be excited about it, tell your community leaders about it.

And you know, then from there, there's certainly volunteer opportunities, donor opportunities.

- [Christine] So, how do they do that?

Is there a number to call?

Is there somebody there all the time that they can knock on a door?

You have to make, you know, an appointment don't you?

- So we have events.

We're having events all throughout the summer, many of which are open to the public.

The best way is to follow us on Facebook and see what's going on currently.

- [Christine] And that is?

- And that is the Madison Theater Peoria.

You can also find us at the Madison Preservation Association on Twitter and Instagram.

Themadisontheaterepeoria.org.

We also have a phone number, which I can share.

- [Christine] Okay, starts with 3-0-9.

- Starts with 3-0-9.

So, we do have a lot of ways, you know, that people can find us and check out the signage on the front of the building.

You know, if nothing else, go look at the signs we have on the windows and call the phone number there.

Email us, info@themadisontheaterpeoria.org.

And we'll get you in there.

We'll get you excited about it.

- [Lee] And I would say, just adding to what he was talking about.

At the volunteer things we've had already, some tours, well, way last fall than that painting party that you referred to back in the spring.

They haven't all, all the volunteers haven't looked like me.

A lot of them are more like him.

And I personally, haven't heard anybody when we say, "Hey, would you like to see the place that you're working on here?"

"Oh yeah, I'd like to see it."

So they go in the theater and they go up in the balcony and they see the projection room, and the event spaces that are above it that I didn't even know were there.

- [Christine] Yeah, I had no idea either.

I saw those online, right.

- [Lee] Right?

I haven't heard anybody say, "No, this is impossible.

This can't be done."

Or even, "Why are we bothering?"

I mean, not one person.

Everyone that has gone through has been excited about the possibilities.

- [Christine] That's reassuring.

- And I might have been one of those people that said, "How would you ever do this?"

But long before my tenure on the board, they've had the professionals in and the professionals had looked and said, "Yeah, we can do this."

This can be done.

This is salvageable.

And this is renovatable, if that's a word.

- Right, and we've seen it in other communities.

It's just taken a long...

It's had a lot of, a lot of criss-crossing kind of road to go.

The fire didn't do too much terrible damage to it?

- The fire burned the curtain, but really that's about it.

There was a significant amount of smoke damage.

But as far as actually fire damage, it was very limited.

- [Christine] Yeah, that's scary.

Okay, what about the G-H-O-S-T?

(Lee laughs) - Are you saying there's just one?

- [Christine] Well, I know that there's supposed to be a little, little child.

I don't know if it's a boy or girl, running around.

Have you experienced it yet?

- I have not met him.

I've heard many stories.

There's also an usher that will help guide you to your seat.

- [Christine] Is this your dad?

- (laughs) I hope so!

I miss him.

I miss him.

- There's supposedly also an actor that had died underneath the stage and still likes to hang out there every once in a while.

- [Christine] Okay, all right.

- [Cody] But all friendly.

- But we haven't experienced them?

Well, if they're poltergeists maybe that's why the building is still standing and available for preservation and restoration.

- [Lee] Yeah, absolutely.

We've both been down there in what were the original dressing rooms and the orchestra pit.

We haven't seen anything yet.

- [Christine] Or felt anything?

- Or felt anything.

- [Christine] Okay.

What do you look forward to most at this stage?

Other than we're going to continue to raise a lot of money, then it's put aside for, it's a needs list, right?

You know, you have to check everything off.

All right.

So what do you look forward to then?

I mean, how do you... - How do you approach?

- I know, yeah, yeah.

- [Lee] how do you approach a project like this?

- I mean it seems like a big, long list, but.

- There's a huge list of things still to do, but also keep in mind that we're four years into this.

We have targeted spring of 2024 for opening.

That's, you know, less than two years away.

So, ambitious, but you know, we have complete modeling of the theater.

The architects and engineers are fully underway.

We're fortunate that the Madison has a sister theater up in Rockford, the Coronado.

And they did a historic renovation there 20 years ago.

So, we're not reinventing any wheels here.

Trying to figure out how do you air condition a space like this?

We say, 'Hey, Coronado, what'd you guys do?"

- [Christine] What did they do?

- So they worked with a national contractor, DLR group, Paulson Borski, who does movie palace to performing arts center conversions for a living, which... - [Christine] Who knew?

He's done dozens and dozens.

And so we've been fortunate to bring him on board.

And the variety of creative solutions.

I mean, you think about when the air conditioner kicks on, the maestro of the symphony can't hear that.

Right?

So, how do you know before you put these things in that it's gonna work perfect?

And we're fortunate to have a lot of expertise in that realm, expertise that far suppresses my knowledge.

But, you know, so working through the design, getting to really good modeling, we're selecting contractors and fully prepared to be underway with construction in early fall.

- So they're all entering bids.

So is that how it's working?

- Yes.

We're doing a combination of design build as opposed to design bid build.

So what that means is we're not necessarily going to, you know, have, so Farmsworth Group is our local architect.

We're not gonna have Farmsworth draw out the complete plumbing systems and say, 'This is how I think the plumber should draw it."

It's the plumbing company gets to design their system.

- [Christine] Can they work with what they have there already?

Or probably not?

- [Cody] Well, our expectation is that 100% of the mechanicals will be new.

Everything from the waterline coming in the building to the sewer going out to the street, and everything in between.

- [Christine] What do you think about that?

- We want it to stand for another hundred years.

- I taught him everything he knows - Yeah.

(chuckles) - I taught him nothing he knows.

- His 25 years on this earth and how, it really is exciting.

How about your friends?

Do they think you're nuts working on something like this?

Just wondering - I love taking them in there.

No, they think it's cool.

And yeah, I love getting anybody in there that we can.

We've had young professionals socials there.

Again, just trying to find reasons to get people in this theater and get them excited about it.

I love standing on the stage and looking at somebody and saying, "If we're not gonna restore it, what are we doing with it?"

We let it sit for another 20 years?

Maybe it would make a great addition to the parking lot that's next door.

And no people are pretty quick to say, "Let's restore it."

- [Christine] Right.

Right.

Well, it is.

It's still standing.

It's been there since 1920.

It's still standing.

It's been through so much.

But the fact that they're recognizing that, you know, some of the stuff that we're building today or even 20 years ago has been razed and something else is replacing it, maybe a parking lot.

- [Lee] Right.

And again, from my perspective, it's the only one left of all the, you know, the theater history of Peoria.

- [Christine] Correct.

It's the only one left.

The Rialto... - [Christine] The Grand Palace.

- Right.

The Rialto went for the civic center, as did the, did the Palace across the street.

My neighborhood theater, neighb, as they called them, it was the Beverly on Knoxville.

That's fall into a new construction.

The, of course, and before my day, the Hippodrome, the Apollo, everything is gone except the Madison.

And whether we, as Peorians like it or not, the "It played in Peoria" or "Will it play in Peoria?

", or Peoria being a vaudeville town and a theater town, that perception exists and what a disappointment to somebody that comes to Peoria for a convention or business.

And they, "Well show me some of this, you know, 'We play in Peoria.'"

Well, we do play in Peoria, all the community theaters and the local groups.

"But where's this history I keep hearing about?".

Well, there's one right there.

And Chris, I would, coming down here, it occurred to me.

I was on a bus trip back from California, way back in my acting days, bus back to Peoria 'cause I didn't have any money.

And we stopped for a period in some big town and got off the bus and you had however long before the next bus.

And I thought, "well, I'll go see the downtown here."

- [Christine] Disappointment.

- It wasn't Peoria.

It was some town out west.

And I'd sure love for somebody to come out of the doors of the Pere Marquette and look across the street and see a marquee saying what was going on right across the street tonight.

Or from the, I always get the name wrong, Four Seasons?

- [Christine] Four Seasons, correct.

- From the Four seasons to look out there and see activity right across the street.

And they finish their convention or their business meetings for the day.

"What can I do tonight?"

- [Christine] Something to do.

- Boom, right there in downtown Peoria.

- [Christine] Well, this is exciting, you guys.

This is very exciting.

And, again, give the email address or the website so that people could type it in and get involved.

- Sure.

The website is themadisonpeoria.org.

The email address is info@themadisonpeoria.org.

Facebook, you can find us at the Madison Theater Peoria dot or the Madison Theater Peoria, or the Madison Preservation Association.

We're also on Instagram, Twitter.

We have a phone number.

- Okay, great.

- [Cody] We're out there.

You can find us.

If you can Google, you can find us.

- And please find us.

- Yes.

- [Christine] That's great.

Well, thank you so much for joining me and I can't wait to see what's going on.

I might even have to bring a paint brush or something, you know?

I'm good at patching plaster a little bit.

- Thank you, Christy.

- Thanks for being here.

I hope you enjoyed learning all about what's happening at the Madison and get involved.

Give 'em a call.

Look, 'em up.

Thanks for joining us.

Stay safe and healthy and hold happiness.

(bright guitar music)