Harris Center gives Broadway shows a home in Folsom

Building a state-of-the-art theater was the route by which Folsom Lake College’s Harris Center for the Arts became a cultural mecca, hosting more than 400 events a year, including touring Broadway shows.

Broadway shows weren’t part of the plan when Folsom Lake College opened in 2004. After all, normally a community college might typically have a 400-seat facility without a lot of amenities. But surveys of potential area audiences showed a greater possibility.

Build it big, and they will come.

The people of Folsom wanted a regional performing arts center, one capable of attracting world class entertainment, and a diverse and enthusiastic audience. They got the Harris Center.

The community even raised funds to augment the college’s budget, allowing the construction of the 80,000 square feet that comprise the Harris Center: three main theaters, art gallery, rehearsal space, recording studio, scene shop and classrooms.

Broadway came to Folsom.

“There are really two major Broadway presenters here in this market,” explains Dave Pier, Executive Director of the Harris Center. “Broadway Sacramento and the Harris Center.”

Broadway Sacramento performs at the Community Center Theater, a larger venue with larger shows. The Community Center Theater seats up to 2,400, compared to the 850-seat capacity of Stage 1, the Harris Center’s main theater.

But many shows aren’t suited to such a large venue.

“Sometimes there are shows that just aren’t big enough to go in the Community Center Theater,” Pier said. “And they are just wonderful in our smaller theater. The theater is designed really well to handle these kinds of shows…It’s a fairly intimate theater, so every seat in the theater is great, and the audience feels really connected to the performers on the stage. The performers can feel that also.”

The Harris Center also offers technical advantages.

“We have a stage house which is actually larger than a lot of Broadway theater stage houses. It’s fully equipped, state-of-the-art … It enables us to do these really amazing shows.”

The 2018-19 season has been the busiest season yet for the Harris Center. Since October, there’s been six Broadway shows, including “A Night with Janice Joplin,” “Finding Neverland,” “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer,” “The Wizard of Oz,” and “Jersey Boys.” February brought “Kinky Boots.” Andrew Loyd Webber’s “Evita” is up next in March.

Rounding out the the season are Monty Python’s “Spamalot,” “Legally Blonde, The Musical,” “Something Rotten!,” and “RAIN: A Tribute to the Beatles.”

In addition to Broadway, the Harris Center hosts all manner of entertainment throughout the year: dance, theater, all different types of concerts, from classical to jazz to rock.

The theater caters to the diverse community that helped build this theater of dreams. Audience members come from Folsom, El Dorado County, the broader Sacramento region, and locations throughout Northern California.

“Part of the magic of having a regional arts center like the Harris Center is that a whole world opens up to you,” Pier said. “You can attend a whole array of performing arts events that before were probably not practical for you to see. I think we’ve actually created a whole new audience here. There’s a whole set of people who weren’t going to shows before at all, and now they’re coming here.”