Treading the Boards

Treading the Boards. A Fitting Tribute. , The Studio Theatre, on the corner of 14th and P Streets since 1987, anchors the Logan Circle/14th Street artistic community. The theatre, founded by director and educator Joy Zinoman and set designer Russell Metheny in 1978, originally rented space in wood sculptor Margery Goldberg's Zenith Square Gallery complex of rowhouses nearby on Rhode Island Avenue. An array of artists worked (and sometimes lived) at Zenith, finding inspiration among their peers until the city forced them out in 1986, citing zoning violations. But Studio Theatre had left six years earlier for affordable space in a former car dealership nearby at 1401 Church Street. Another showroom, across 14th Street from this sign, was the first of three adjoining buildings renovated by the theater., In 1980 the pioneering Source Theatre, founded by Bart Whiteman three years earlier, moved into a former auto supply store at 1809 14th. A few years later Source took over a one-time Oldsmobile showroom at 1835., Although Washington never had the manufacturing activity of other cities, it developed a stock of industrial spaces. Here they came in the form of auto showrooms and service shops as well as printing shops and other light industry. By the 1970s, with the car showrooms long gone, these spacious, affordable buildings beckoned. Among the institutions that took root here are Woolly Mammoth, Horizons, Church Street and Keegan theaters as well as art galleries. Over time these blocks grew into an important arts district, and its risk-taking theaters gained renown in the regional theatre movement., To return to the Metro Red line, walk one block north on Q Street and turn left. The Dupont Circle Station is six blocks west on Q Street.