PORT ANGELES — With $182,000 raised toward the $235,000 offer made last winter on the shuttered Lincoln Theater, Scott Nagel, Karen Powell and their crew of volunteers will host an open house this Saturday.
The public is invited to tour the 99-year-old cinema, 132 E. First St., from noon until 4 p.m., while Nagel and Powell, his wife and business partner, lay out their plans to turn it into a nonprofit arts center for films, plays, concerts, dance performances and even company parties.
On the big screen in one theater Saturday, old-time cartoons will play. Live entertainment — with a lineup still being firmed up — will fill the Lincoln’s other theater, while candy, popcorn and soft drinks are served in the lobby.
“Free treats, so it’ll be fun,” said Nagel, adding that members of the Light up the Lincoln advisory board and volunteer team will be circulating and answering questions all afternoon.
Several are members of Revitalize Port Angeles, the grass-roots group that offers information about supporting the Lincoln campaign on its website, RevitalizePortAngeles.org.
The Lincoln volunteers include Carol Sinton, Leslie Robertson, Courtney Buchanan and architect Michael Gentry, who has created renderings of how the reopened Lincoln might look.
This is the first chance, Nagel added, for general audiences to come inside the Lincoln since the owner, Sun Basin Theatres of Wenatchee, closed it down in March 2014.
Also during the open house, Nagel will give two talks, at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., on his plans for the “Port Angeles performing arts center,” as he calls the project.
“I’ve budgeted an hour for each: a half-hour for the PowerPoint and then lots of questions and ideas,” Nagel said.
The open house will coincide with the inaugural Arts & Draughts beer-wine-art-music-food festival, an event that will occupy the downtown blocks of Laurel Street from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday.
The Port Angeles Downtown Association is putting it all on, so information awaits at portangelesdowntown.com.
At first, Nagel wasn’t crazy about the date of Arts & Draughts, coming as it does two weekends before the Dungeness Crab & Seafood Festival, the downtown Port Angeles event he produces every October.
But he’s decided to join forces with it, since the Lincoln Theater and the new festival are both about bringing people downtown.
He hopes lots of people will partake in the festival, wander around inside the Lincoln — and perhaps pick up an application to serve on the reopened theater’s board of directors.
As he has done since making the offer to purchase the Lincoln, Nagel continues to seek contributions from individuals and companies; he encourages anyone curious about donating or volunteering to come to the open house, phone him at 360-808-3940, or both.
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Features Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5062, or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
