Both residents and tourists can attest to the fact that Huntsville has a great deal to offer in addition to its business, military, and tech sectors. Its cultural patchwork is vibrantly patterned with overlapping threads of music, arts, entertainment, history, cuisine, sports, and much more.

Fantasy Playhouse Children’s Theatre & Academy is a key element of Huntsville’s rich arts scene, and like the city itself, its greater contributions to the local community run deep. In 2020-2021, for instance, its virtual and live programs reached a total of 31,729 individuals, including over 21,000 youth.

As the community recovers from the social, financial, and educational impacts of the pandemic, Fantasy Playhouse’s leadership is keenly aware of the loss of educational opportunities resulting from necessary changes to instruction over the past couple of years. It seeks to play a role in remedying that through an expansion of its programs, not only in the arts, but also in STEM.

A look into Fantasy Playhouse’s new educational facility and theatre

With the worst of the pandemic in the rearview mirror, Fantasy Playhouse Executive Director Karen Mockensturm noted that enrollment in summer camp has greatly increased with 750 kids coming through summer camp this year at its main campus at 3312 Long Ave in Huntsville and at Bob Jones High School in Madison.

The “Spotlight on the Future” capital campaign seeks to allow Fantasy Playhouse to fully spread its wings with the construction of a new 35,700 sf theater and educational facility on the corner of Holmes Avenue and Triana Boulevard in the Terry Heights neighborhood. The Playhouse owns the land, but construction is awaiting funding before it can proceed. Once completed, Mockensturm anticipates hiring two dozen additional full time staff.

According to Mockensturm, plans for the new campus initially started as a $9 million project. “Then we brought on Robins & Morton, which just completed the amphitheater. So we’ve been working with our construction partners for a long time.”

She noted that the cost increased to $12 million in fall 2020, and a later spike in construction costs led to a further increase to $16 million.

“At this point the board sat for six weeks over Christmas because they were in a state of shock,” Mockensturm said. “We decided that we would step back from moving any dirt [and] we would communicate this with our funders that so far we were just focusing on fundraising. So that’s what’s happening right now…the reason we did it that way is that we didn’t want to waste time going back to redesign. We didn’t want to cut our noses off to spite our faces to do a redesign, ‘cause that’s the next step.”

Mockensturm stated that Fantasy Playhouse made it through Covid in a sound fiscal position. With the help of government programs, the state of Alabama, the NEA Arts Council, and other sources of funding, Fantasy Playhouse managed to keep going without letting anyone go.

“We’re not going to move dirt right now, but we did a huge strategic plan so we’re continuing to grow,” she said.

The nonprofit has recently hired a full time artistic director, and according to Mockensturm, “our programming is growing out the wazoo,” with Playhouse leadership beginning to implement programs now that were planned for the future facility. Thanks to resources provided by a state grant funder, for instance, the Playhouse was able to buy some equipment that will allow them to launch a technical theater lab.

Mockensturm provided an overview of the multidisciplinary offerings to be provided by the academy, which will engage students in opportunities to learn valuable STE(A)M skills. She referred to the technical theater program as a “game changer” for theater arts education.

“There are many kids that have gone into technical theater from Fantasy, they got their start but they didn’t get hands-on…you can’t formally teach it if you don’t have a theater,” Mockensturm said. “This new program will appeal to students interested in robotics, technical manipulation, animation, filmmaking, and so on.”

Students on this track will spend much of their summer theater camp in the tech lab, where they will be introduced to color analysis, Google Sketchup, lighting and sound engineering, costume and pattern making, makeup design, and more.

“They will begin all of that here and then choose their specialty,” Mockensturm explained, adding that while other students are performing, the tech students will be doing hands-on work behind the scenes to make it happen.

“These are the future performers and the future engineers [who will be] working at Orion. All of this music industry growth and economic growth and job/workforce development all starts right here.”

During the school year, Fantasy in the Classroom takes the show on the road as an outreach program.

“Now we’re modifying Fantasy in the Classroom to take technical theater to the schools, because once we introduce them in elementary schools, then they can funnel into the magnet programs or into Bob Jones or James Clemens. It’s all workforce development,” Mockensturm said.

“The reason we do what we do is because arts engagement for students makes them engage academically, makes them engage in success…the dropout rate in under-resourced communities across the country is 22%, [but] for kids who are involved in arts education, the dropout rate converts to 4%. So that’s all it is. They may not be Broadway stars but they’re all going to be engaged and inspired for the rest of their lives.”

Fantasy Playhouse is also targeting school readiness for preschoolers. Mockensturm noted that one of the best ways to engage young students and to provide skills in reading comprehension and early math skills is through the creative arts. This fall, they will be piloting a Mothers’ Morning Out program dedicated to fine arts for 3-4 year olds in preparation for the establishment of a certified preschool once the new facility is complete.

According to Mockensturm, while Fantasy may be outgrowing its current facility, “we decided we’re not waiting anymore just for this building. It’s just like ‘build it and it will come.’ Like I said, we’re in really good shape–it’s frustrating for us as educators to be kind of on top of each other but it’s also inspiring…it’ll come.”

While a number of corporate, state, federal, and city partners have contributed to the Spotlight Campaign, additional funding is still desperately needed for Fantasy Playhouse to meet its Spotlight Campaign goals.

“What we fight against here is [that] the arts seem like they’re just extra. And that’s what’s different about the City of Huntsville–I mean, coming alongside us and partnering with this program, championing it, has been instrumental. But we have yet to identify a Fantasy Playhouse grad that can stroke a $10 million check like they did at Space Camp,” Mockensturm laughed.

One major donor so far is Meta, which has earned naming rights to the technical suite. Other major supporters include Torch Technologies, the Daniel Foundation, the Alabama Council of the Arts, PPG, the cities of Madison and Huntsville, the Madison County Commission, and a number of private donors.

“$10 million would change everything here, and then some.”

Asked about the timeframe for construction, she responded that it depends on funding.

“If we can push it between that $7-10 million mark, that’s when I can start to gain some financing to help Fantasy step into the gap. So we’re talking about another $4-6 million. That’s key right now. And I think that with everything Fantasy does right now it’s going to be piecemeal here and there, but we’ve got some amazing naming opportunities and amazing people in this region.”