Despite closing 20 years ago, the theater hasn’t been without plans
First established as a movie house in 1938 by E.M. Loew, the Mohawk Theatre on Main Street could soon enter a new act with the help of private developers.
Last Tuesday, April 23, the North Adams City Council voted to allow Mayor Thomas Bernard to execute a purchase and sale agreement of the theater, marking a significant step in the history of the theater which ceased daily operations in 1991.
Bernard said that the decision to issue a request for proposals stems from making good on a promise last year to involve the community in discussions about what the theater could be. He also shared that it stems from other successful projects undertaken in the city.
“When you look at the Norad Mill, when you look at Greylock Works, TOURISTS, all of these projects are rooted in adaptive reuse,” Bernard said.
However, Bernard is not set on what he would like to see the space become, leaving that for potential buyers to outline in their proposals.
“I don’t have something where I’m trying to be directive,” Bernard said. “I’m really trying to put this out in a way that creates maximum space for vision and creativity. The vision piece from my end is what reactivates that building that has been mothballed for twenty years.”
The plan, however, was not always for the Mohawk Theatre to be sold.
The Barrett Years
State Representative and North Adams Mayor from 1984-2009, John Barrett III said that upon leaving office, there was a plan for the theater’s development.
“This is what the Director [of MASS MoCA], Joseph Thompson, has said about downtown North Adams,” Barrett said. “He said, ‘I would give anything to have a conference center in the downtown of North Adams, what a better place than that?”
“Nine hundred people could be seated in it, beam the digital feeds into the place, concerts, people talking from around the country — this is the future,” Barrett continued. “The amazing part is you’re taking a theater that opened in 1938 and you’re adapting to today, which isn’t that the same thing that we did with MASS MoCA?”
Barrett’s vision was inspired by the success of the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington and the Calvin Theater in Northampton restoration projects.
“I saw what it did in Northampton, I saw what it was doing in Great Barrington — they have digital feeds there and I could see the same thing,” Barrett said. “I think at the time, you could’ve beamed the Rolling Stones concert from England into the Mohawk Theatre, and you could have 900 people who were really there on stage.”
In 1988, the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center found itself in a similar position, arguably worse than the Mohawk Theatre currently finds itself. The theater faced demolition following the purchase by a cinema chain. In 1995, the venue found itself protected by Great Barrington’s Downtown Historic District and renovations began in 2003.
Currently, the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center is an established nonprofit organization that houses movie screenings, live music performances, comedy acts and is available for rent.
Barrett was also adamant about having community involvement in the project. He believed that community involvement would help ensure that the project offered something of value to every member of the community, as was the case with MASS MoCA.
“They bought into MASS MoCA,” Barrett said. “I often tell the story that in the 14 years that from when we announced MASS MoCA, until the day that it opened, not one negative letter appeared in the newspaper about MASS MoCA by any resident of the city of North Adams.”
For Barrett, the vision he had for the Mohawk Theatre remains the most viable link between downtown North Adams and MASS MoCA. His plan saw the Mohawk Theatre becoming home to conferences, concerts and events produced by MCLA.
“It was all built upon a vision,” Barrett continued. “The vision was if you have a theater, you have MASS MoCA, and you have culture in your downtown, and you have people living there — the only way you build any neighborhood, whether it be downtown or anyplace else, is that it has to be owner-occupied.”
Barrett said that when MASS MoCA opened in 1999, the theater’s marquee had been restored and that it was lit up for the first time.
With a vision in place, Barrett says a new roof was installed on the Mohawk Theatre, which he believes is still good. However, building inspector William Meranti said at a city council meeting in February that it would need repair soon.
Unsuccessful MCLA Partnership
2009 saw the city impacted by the nationwide recession, which made further progress difficult. Richard Alcombright defeated Barrett, becoming mayor and bringing his own ideas for the theater’s revival.
Under Alcombright’s tenure, the city pursued a partnership with MCLA that would see the space become home to performing arts programs. At the time, Bernard served as the executive assistant to then-president Mary Grant.
Bernard shared that the College and city discussed different operating models that included the neighboring Dowlin Block building.
“One of the models that we looked at was a renovation that was theater-based as the model, that used the building next door, The Dowlin Block, to do several things,” Bernard said. “It used that building to provide retail and commercial space in the front of the building to generate revenue that would help offset the renovation and operating costs of the theater.”
“It used the back part of the building as the production support space so that you wouldn’t need to engineer a production house off the back of the building and then it used the upper floors as rental income generating whether that was condo development combined with student development,” Bernard continued.
Despite the conversations, Bernard said that the College was unable to find a model that worked for them.
“The housing piece didn’t quite work financially for MCLA, the building next door has now been sold, and it would take significant investment to make that a performance venue,” Bernard said.
After MCLA was out of the question, Alcombright told The Berkshire Eagle he would have likely pursued an RFP. The former mayor sought RFPs for the former Sullivan School and department of public works buildings.
What Will It Take?
The building is stripped back to the studs and bricks. There are currently no seats or bathrooms in the theater, and it is currently non-compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. However, Barrett said that there are tax breaks available for potential investors.
After the city of North Adams came into ownership of the theater, several historic tax credits were made available for the space on the local and state level. Downtown North Adams is also a part of the new tax opportunity zones created in 2017 by the Trump administration and has several new market tax credits.
With these tax credits available, Barrett estimates that an investor would need to contribute around $2 million to make the space fully functional again.
The Last of Its Kind
Local historian Paul W. Marino shared that the first Mohawk Theatre was originally going to be built in 1926 by George Mosser. However, every theater in North Adams at that time was under the control of the Sullivan Brothers, who built, but never finished, the Capitol Theatre as a threat to possible competitors.
According to Marino, that threat scared off Mosser.
However, Marino said that by 1937, most of the theaters were owned by Western Massachusetts Theatres in Springfield, except for the Richmond Theatre, which Boston-based theater tycoon E.M. Loew held a lease on. The lease was set to expire, however, and Loew wanted to maintain a local presence.
“He wanted to maintain a presence here, but there wasn’t enough land in downtown North Adams to build a theater on,” Marino said. “So what he did was, he bought lots and little pieces of lots until he had enough space to build a theater on.”
The Mohawk Theatre opened for business Nov. 5, 1938, with the theater reaching its full capacity of 1,300. However, the space differed from its original plan.
“The Mohawk had this gorgeous oval lobby with glass block in one wall, gorgeous, that was supposed to be the actual lobby,” Marino said. “He was planning on putting the entryway from Eagle Street but the Baptists stood in his way. One of the Baptist Deacons said, ‘There’s never been a saloon or a theater on Eagle Street and as long as the Baptists are here, there never will be.’ ”
“Unfortunately, they didn’t hold up their end of the bargain when Desperados moved in, because they do have a bar there,” Marino continued.
The Richmond Theatre fell victim to urban renewal in the 1960s following a fire, and the Paramount Theatre was renovated to make way for retail.
A Place of Memories
A fixture of North Adams’ downtown, many longtime residents of the city hold dear memories of the theater when it saw better days. Robert Bence, emeritus professor of history, political science and public policy, recalls many of the shows he saw at the theater.
“I thought Arlo Guthrie and his family brought down the house when I saw him,” Bence said.
In addition to performances, Bence also recalls some of the films that he saw at the theater.
“I saw the first Star Wars movie there with a kid that I was a Big Brother for, and I think that’s still the best Star Wars movie and I saw it at the Mohawk,” Bence said.
In Bence’s opinion, Images Cinema in Williamstown could be a model for the Mohawk Theatre.
“That’s run by a non-profit organization and they show an interesting collection of movies,” Bence said. “It’s a small theater too and they have memberships.”
A longtime resident of North Adams, Bence would like to see the theater active again, in some capacity.
“It would be comforting for most of us who have lived here for a long or short time to know that it’s functioning, the same way that Mass MoCA is comforting,” Bence said.
Marino proposed forming an organization which could present smaller-scale performances throughout the city and raise money for the Mohawk’s restoration.
“If a group was formed under the moniker ‘Mohawk’s Baby Brother,’ it could put on shows, movies, concerts and lectures in various small venues around the city — for instance in churches, in school gyms and auditoriums, and storefronts,” Marino said. “If we had a theater like that here, even it was a small-scale like ‘Mohawk’s Baby Brother,’ we would be bringing people to North Adams.”
For Barrett, the Mohawk Theatre’s design still leaves an impression on him.
“That’s a 1938 E.M. Loew art deco theater,” Barrett said. “How many of those are left?”
This story was originally published in The Beacon on May 2, 2019.
