Long-anticipated improvements at the Kentucky Center, concentrated in the 2,400-seat Whitney Hall, are continuing this summer, with most of the current phase to be completed by July 28 to accommodate the three-week run of “Jersey Boys.” Jersey Boys will perform through August 15, 2010 in Whitney Hall.
Even as that Broadway hit runs in the evenings, plans call for reupholstering Whitney Hall’s seats between midnight and 8 a.m. daily. The purple seats, last re-covered in 1997, will be redone, with some in burgundy and some in gray.
“You won’t be able to tell we were in there” working overnight, when people come to see the show, said David Holland, center spokesman.
The center at Sixth and Main streets, which opened in 1983, received nearly $9million from the 2008 General Assembly for upgrades. Some facilities that were state of the art a quarter-century ago had become obsolete or nearly so, officials said.
The work, begun in 2009, is being spread over three summers to avoid any major inconvenience for performers and patrons. This summer “we have been careful not to cancel or move a single show,” Holland said. At the same time, there has been significant activity in the center, with Music Theatre Louisville scheduling two-week runs of three shows in the Bomhard Theater and “Jersey Boys” to play from late July to mid-August in the Whitney.
