Paramount Theater of Charlottesville

Theater/production: The Paramount Theater of Charlottesville, Virginia is a nonprofit performing arts center dedicated to presenting a wide range of education, arts, civic and entertainment events for diverse community audiences in The restored historic Paramount Theater. Since it re-opened in 2004, The Paramount has welcomed more than 1.3 million visitors to thousands of events including live performances, movies, high-definition screenings and broadcasts, guided historic tours, meetings, and free community events. The Paramount has seen a great increase of attendees since The covid-19 pandemic has waned. We have not seen a complete recovery resembling The numbers from fiscal 2019, but The Theater is on track to host over 250 events with more than 75,000 total attendees this season. The 91-year-old historic Paramount Theater continues to serve as "charlottesville's living room," as The Theater's staff and board are committed to providing safe and diverse entertainment for all guests, staff, and volunteers as it continues to serve as a beacon of inspiration to The entire local and visiting community.

Community access: The mary p. reese community access fund (mprcaf) was established to ensure that all members of our community have access to The arts in The historic Paramount Theater. Each year, The Paramount partners with more than 70 area agencies and nonprofit groups such as alzheimer's association, big brothers big sisters, boys and girls club, Georgia's friends, international neighbors, united way readykids, as well as school groups and many other community organizations to offer complimentary tickets to all Paramount- presented events. In addition, The mprcaf provides nonprofit organizations with The ability to utilize Theater space at a discounted rate. Each year dozens of local nonprofit organizations host performances, speakers, and events to further their respective missions. Among these groups are The Virginia film festival, festival of The book, light house studio, literacy volunteers, Charlottesville band, Charlottesville opera, uva's office for diversity, equity, and inclusion, and many more. The mprcaf also makes it possible to host free community events each year, such as uva sporting events, historic tours, or community appreciation events honoring local educators or peer not for profit organizations. Lastly, The mprcaf helps ensure an accessible environment with open captioning, interpreters, and sensory-friendly programming. Despite covid and its implications during 2021-22, our mission to educate, enchant, enrich, and enlighten was unwavering through our community access program, and we received truly heartwarming feedback from participating community partners to tell us so: "The Paramount has been so good to all of us, through thick and thin you have helped to make our lives normal again, whenever that may be. We are grateful." - community partner liaison, thomas jefferson adult & career education (tjace@pvcc). "thank you so much for continuously sharing these opportunities and opening The doors of The Paramount to The residents of Georgia's friends and to so many other organizations trying to make a difference. We are so incredibly grateful for your kindness and generosity" - community partner liaison, Georgia's friends, Inc.

Arts education: The arts education program presents school-day educational performances for students in grades pre-k through 12 from central Virginia to experience live performing arts in The historic Paramount Theater. We are committed to offering programming that is artistically rich, social emotional relevant, and reflects diverse cultures and races, and we hold steadfast to our goal to ensure access for all area youth. Programming often includes master classes, pre-show lectures, artist q&a sessions, and in-school workshops with guest artists to deepen The overall experience. All programming connects to Virginia standards of learning as well as social emotional learning standards and includes study guides. While The pandemic prevented The Paramount from welcoming our school communities in person during 2021- 22 to experience live arts education performances, we remained committed to keeping The arts and magic alive in The hearts and minds of our school age audience members through high quality and accessible arts education experiences. We were excited to continue sharing with educators and school communities a robust curated collection of arts education virtual resources. This included artistic and educational innovations of artists and partner organizations who have graced our very own stage and "virtually" opening doors to experiencing music, Theater, dance, and more. There were opportunities for live engagement with artists through q&a's and workshops to enhance and enrich classroom learning, whether remote or in- person, in meaningful and accessible ways. Finally, our summer youth Theater residency returned in june 2022 after a two-year hiatus due to The pandemic. This week-long Theater residency brings two professional teaching artists to collaborate with dozens of local students (ages 6 - 16) in mounting and performing a full-scale musical production on The Paramount's stage, for all The community to enjoy.