123 East Water St
Charlottesville, VA 22902
Live Arts is a local theater company located in
Charlottesville, Virginia. Although they have a small paid staff, most of the actors, light designers, set builders, etc. are volunteers.
Live Arts puts on 3-4 major productions each year, along with a few dozen smaller performances. Live Arts has two performance areas: a large area on the second floor known as downstage, and a smaller, black-box style theater on the third floor.
For most of its life, Live Arts was located in a smallish, labrythine building on East Market Street, only a few blocks away from its new location. The new building opened its doors, in a fairly unfinished state, October 31st of 2003.
Although the stairs have finally been built (!), much of the remaining work on the building remains to be done. Although the new building is much more colorful, larger, and slightly better designed for theatre (although not by much!), some people, myself included, have doubts over whether this multi-million dollar building really is superior to the trusty old Live Arts place.