Eric Goulden, chairman of the Astor Theatre Society, speaks to theatre supporters on Thursday. Karen Murphy, of the J&W Murphy Foundation, and Lynn Cochrane, vice-chair of the Astor board, look on. (Rick Conrad)

The board of the Astor Theatre on Thursday unveiled some details of a plan they hope will make the theatre the centre of arts and culture on the South Shore.

“We are definitely the envy of a lot of other theatres in Nova Scotia,” Astor Theatre Society chairman Eric Goulden said.

“And it is a very, very valuable treasure.”

The historic Liverpool theatre, which opened in 1902, recently received a $500,000 donation from the J&W Murphy Foundation. The five-year funding commitment will help with the Astor’s operational expenses, and help improve its marketing, promotion and fundraising efforts.

Board members invited the community on Thursday afternoon to learn more about the foundation’s support.

The contribution will help the Astor work on long-term projects to make the theatre sustainable. Three consultants will be hired to come up with fundraising and communications plans and oversee the process.

Heather White Brittain, the director of development with the Imperial Theatre in Saint John, will lead the Astor’s fundraising and sponsorship development efforts. That will include creating a fund development database that will help the Astor secure more sustainable donations from corporations and other foundations.

Cathy Neumiller, a communications and marketing professional based in Halifax, will help create a new marketing and communications plan for the theatre. That will include a newly designed website, a subtle rebranding and more community outreach.

“We don’t have the capacity in house to do this work,” said Lynn Cochrane, vice-chair of the Astor board. 

“(The employees) do miracles every day with what they have to work with. But the fund development and marketing communications side are specialist areas and require specialists to do them.”

Cochrane said a lot of the work for the first year will be behind the scenes. But lovers of the Astor should start seeing some changes by the end of this year.

Neumiller says she hopes to harness the enthusiasm of the Astor’s sizable and dedicated group of volunteers.

“It’s really about relationships,” she said in an interview.

“The ultimate with communications is striking up a relationship with someone and finding out what they’re passionate about. The goal is to find the people that are the most passionate and get them on board to help achieve the things that need to be done because there’s a lot.”

Jean Robinson-Dexter, a former executive director of the Astor and longtime chair of the Liverpool International Theatre Festival, will act as a project manager.

The president of Horizons Community Development Associates also helped Cochrane create the funding proposal to the Murphy foundation.

“I guess I’ll be a bit of a trouble-shooter and a bit of a historian about the organization and the kinds of things that the theatre does,” Robinson-Dexter said in an interview.

“I’ll be doing regular check-ins with the two wonderful consultants and sharing that back to the board, making sure we’re on track in terms of deliverables and timelines. It’s a great opportunity to be back and contributing to the Astor again.”

The Astor announced the “life-changing” contribution from the J&W Murphy Foundation in April. 

The foundation was established in 2008 by the late Janet and Dr. William Murphy, longtime Liverpool residents. Dr. Murphy co-founded the thriving Mersey Seafoods in 1964. 

It contributes to a wide variety of charitable causes, especially in Queens County.

The foundation’s Karen Murphy told QCCR on Thursday that they had many discussions with the Astor board about how to help.

“And our conclusion was that we could assist in some funding to take away some of the operational worries so the focus could be on future-proofing the facility,” she said.

“It’s often capital projects that get a lot of attention. But we found with especially small- and medium-sized organizations, operational funding is often forgotten. And sometimes that’s the key to all the other creativity-building that needs to happen.”

She said that she and her family have been longtime supporters of the Astor and were happy to help “take it to the next level”.

“When people find out I’m from Liverpool, they invariably mention the Astor. That tells you what a legacy is already in place. And it’s on all of us to keep adding to that and to keep building it up. This place has to be here for the next 100 years like it has been already.”

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More than 70 people turned out for the Astor Theatre Society’s annual general meeting on Monday evening in Liverpool. (Rick Conrad)

After years of discussing the need for it, the board of the Astor Theatre says that 2024 will be the year that they get serious about securing funding for a modern HVAC system.

The 122-year-old building has only ceiling fans in its performance space, making it pretty steamy in the middle of the summer.

The Astor Theatre Society board announced at their annual general meeting on Monday night that it plans to go after federal and provincial funding this year to make the whole building more energy-efficient and to install a state-of-the-art heat pump system.

That system would keep the Astor cool in the summer and warm in the winter. They also plan to replace windows, reinsulate the roof and change all lighting to energy-efficient LEDs.

Board member Lynn Cochrane told about 70 people gathered for the AGM that the board will work with the Region of Queens, which owns the building, to ensure they maintain the structural integrity and acoustics of the Astor.

She said it’s part of a major capital campaign that the Astor will launch this year.

They also plan to create an endowment fund, supported by corporate and individual donations, to ensure the Astor’s financial security.

“It is our Astor,” Cochrane said. “So this endowment will protect it for many years, and hopefully save us from having to go hand to mouth with our finances every year.”

The Astor also got a $100,000 donation from the Greenfield-based sawmill Harry Freeman and Son Limited. 

Board chairman John Simmonds told members that the Astor is in good financial shape, even though it reported a $40,393 deficit for the nine months ending Dec. 31.

The theatre’s total audience last year from April 1 to Dec. 31 was about 12,000, with 60 per cent of that coming from Queens County and 40 per cent from outside the region.

“So we’ve had a lot of people through these doors,” Simmonds said.

The first four months of 2024, however, were stronger, with 18 events bringing almost 3,750 people to the theatre, and a net gain of $27,900.

The Astor hosted many popular concerts and events from January to April, including the late February/early March production of Follies, its first adult musical production since 2018.

“The last few months have been very important to the Astor, we’ve been so successful, we’ve had so much going on,” Simmonds said.

He said the board plans to sign a 10-year lease with the region, which will help the Astor in its fundraising goals. 

“It also gives us an opportunity to go after grants that require a 10-year lease so that we can establish to the grantors that we are going to stay around for a long time. So that could bring in some fairly big numbers to allow us to do some of the things we want to do.”

The Astor’s net assets as of Monday’s AGM are $232,000, according to treasurer Loris Azzano.

The Astor Theatre Society’s members also voted to add three new people to the board of directors, bringing the total to 11.

They are Melanie Atkinson, who also volunteers at QCCR, Terri Faber and Cynthia Walker.

They join Simmonds, Azzano, Cochrane, Anne Espenant, Willo Treschow, Dan Williams, Heather White Brittain and Colleen Wolfe.

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com

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