City inks lease to reopen theater

The Paramount in Peekskill will be turning the lights back on May 26.

On Wednesday outside the Brown Street theater, Peekskill city officials signed a 17-year lease agreement with Red House Entertainment L.L.C.. Red House will manage and operate the 82-year-old venue, to be renamed Paramount Hudson Valley.
The Paramount closed suddenly last October. Paramount Center for the Arts Inc., the nonprofit that ran the 1,024-seat theater, dissolved in November facing a $300,000 budget shortfall.

The city will pay utilities at the theater for the first six months and receive 5 percent of adjusted gross income from ticket sales.
Red House, a for-profit venture with a non-profit subsidiary attached, projects the city will receive $45,000 in the first year and $110,000 in the second year in ticket sales revenue.

Red House is required to hold 25 ticketed shows in the first year of operation and 75 in the second year. The company expects to gross $900,000 in the first year.

Red House’s principal is  Garrison sound engineer Kurt Heitmann, who runs CP Communications, an Elmsford-based production equipment company.

In March, the city picked Red House as the theater tenant from three finalists and began lease negotiations. Proposals by Tarrytown Music Hall and Paramount Phoenix, a group run by Peekskill restaurateur Arnold Paglia, also were considered.