Summer Place has a new Summer Home

Community Yellow Box Theatre at Rickert & Ogden

Our long search for a temporary home for the 2019 summer season has ended! We're so grateful to the folks at Community Christian Church who have opened their beautiful black box theatre for us to perform this summer while Naperville Central HS Auditorium is being renovated.

We learned back in late November of last year that we would be "homeless" during the 2019 Summer Season. Naperville Central High School planned to renovate the lighting system in the Auditorium that we've called our summer home for over 20 years. Of course, the timing was best for the High School so as not to disrupt its use by the students during the school year, but it sent us packing.

After months of hunting, we have our home for this summer. We'll be performing at the Community Yellow Box Theatre inside the Community Christian Church, 1635 Emerson Ln, at the corner of Ogden Avenue and Rickert Drive on the west side of Naperville. All 3 productions will be in their beautiful 220+ seat black box theatre. There's ample parking and wheelchair access, and only a few blocks west of our regular venue.

View of the Black Box Theatre from the back row. The theatre is 40 feet wide. The stage area is 20 feet deep.
Imagine rippling ocean waves and the island of Bali Ha'i on the projection screen!

There will be a couple changes specific to our new host.

First, our traditional Sunday 3pm Matinee will now be on Saturday at 2pm. The location is busy on Sundays with worship activities.

Secondly, our set design will be different since the space is different.  We're known for big sets. Just last year we recreated the Wrigley Field right field bleachers for our production of Bleacher Bums, including the blue sky, cinder block walls and of course the ivy. This summer it'll be a little different, but if you've never experienced a black box theatre presentation, you're in for a treat! The performance is more intimate since you're closer to the actors, and the set is more minimal letting the imagination fill in the gaps. But they have a large screen on the back wall and we'll use that when appropriate to enhance the experience.

We're very thankful to the good people of Community Christian Church, the numerous other churches and schools who were excited to have us but were already otherwise engaged, and of course our partners in the Naperville Park District who tried very hard to find us alternative performance space once they heard of our plight. It really was touch and go.

Map of the location of our 2019 Summer home. Plenty of free parking. For directions visit Google Maps.

We researched the few other theatre locations nearby and found that nearly every venue was busy. The black box theatre at Community Christian Church had not committed yet for summer use and patiently waited until March when we ourselves waiting for the District 204 school system to tell us if their high school auditoriums would be available, since those stages are similar to what we've been used to. (It's their policy to wait on confirmations until March in case they decide to do maintenance during the summer.) After the wait, D204 informed us they in fact were already booked except for a small window that would have accommodated only one show but would change our performance schedule, and even then the fees they requested along with the notification were far beyond what we anticipated or could afford.

But we're very happy that we've found a home for this summer. We think you'll be too when you attend one, two or all 3 productions this summer. Take a look at our SHOWS page to see the details of what's in store.