The Rep Under Dr. Patricia McIlrath (1964-1985)
Appointed chairman of the University of Kansas City (now UMKC) Theatre Department and director of the University Playhouse in 1954, Dr. McIlrath, believing in the importance of exposing theatre students to the rigors and demanding standards of professional theatre, long dreamed of establishing a company that could provide them such opportunities and also give Kansas City a notable stage company of its own. In 1964, she formed the UMKC Summer Repertory Theatre in the same era when many other companies destined to be recognized as leaders of the nationwide not-for-profit resident theatre movement (such as the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, Seattle Repertory Theatre, and the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles) were also springing to life.
That same founding year, 1964, James Costin was appointed the Summer Rep‘s administrative director, creating a partnership that would continue for twenty years.
Professional actors, community players, and members of the UMKC Theatre Department, operating on a shoestring budget, worked together that first season to present the Summer Rep's two-week fledgling season. Fifteen hundred patrons attended performances of The Corn is Green by Emlyn Williams and Private Lives by Noël Coward and performing out of a quonset hut on the UMKC campus.
In 1967, the Rep became affiliated with Actors’ Equity Association, the national union of professional actors. As the theatre continued to develop, Dr. Mac launched a touring program. The organization took the name "Missouri Repertory Theatre" in 1968. Actors and directors of national and international acclaim shared their talents with Kansas City actors and audiences.
In 1979, the company moved into the Helen F. Spencer Theatre in the newly-constructed UMKC Center for the Performing Arts. It was named for Helen Elizabeth Foresman Spencer (1902–1982) who along with her husband Kenneth Aldred Spencer (died 1960) built the Spencer Chemical Company which was ultimately sold to the Gulf Oil Company in 1963. The assets of both Spencers would go into the Kenneth A. and Helen F. Spencer Foundation which provided philanthropies throughout the Kansas City area.
That same year marked the not-for-profit incorporation of Missouri Repertory Theatre, under the name MRT, Inc. (later changed to Missouri Repertory Theatre, Inc.), formalizing the long-standing partnership between the University of Missouri-Kansas City and Kansas City's civic leaders through the creation of a volunteer board of directors.
UMKC provided critical sustaining support in the early years of this new not-for-profit corporation, and it continues to support the Rep in four ways:
- through direct cash support on an annual basis,
- through cash subsidy of salaries and benefits for the Rep's artistic and administrative staff,
- by allowing the Rep cost-free use of UMKC's spaces for its administrative offices, the technical facilities needed to create scenery, costumes, lighting, and sound,
- the use of Helen F. Spencer Theatre without rent or utility costs.
The Rep, directed by its board, has now operated independently of UMKC for 27 years, and it continues to enjoy the benefits of maintaining its strong commitment to and a close relationship with the university and its theatre training programs.
Read more about this topic: Kansas City Repertory Theatre