Sad news to report out of the local theater scene today as the Balagan Theatre is no more. After eight years, the non-profit fringe theater company simply faced too many financial hurdles to continue producing plays. Balagan was best known for putting on rocking (often slightly quirky) musicals like Spring Awakening, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog, and Avenue Q. The theater had pushed to expand in previous years despite no longer having a permanent home at the Erickson Theatre, but the debts eventually piled up to an unmanageable level.
Both Balagan Theatre’s founder Jake Groshong and its artistic director Louis Hobson left the company this summer to form the for-profit entity Indie Theatricals. As reported by The Seattle Times, the duo still hopes to put on the two world premieres that were set to be part of Balagan’s 2014–15 season: Citizen Ruth and Make Me Bad. The Balagan co-production of Dogfight (Oct 23–Nov 22) at ArtsWest will be the last production with the theater company’s fingerprints on it, though it will now solely be produced by ArtsWest. There is no word yet on refunds for those that already purchased tickets for the 2014–15 season.
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