When the historic Brookfield Theater building at 3723 Grand Blvd. was up for sale earlier this year, there were two offers for the property. One of them, accepted by the seller, later turned into the village’s acquisition of the parcel through a contract assignment; the other offer was from the Glaser Players, an up-and-coming community theater group that hopes to make a space for the art somewhere in Brookfield.
While the group is still getting its footing, leader John Dumas, who also helps run the Share Food Share love food pantry in Brookfield, said they have big plans for the space, which the village aims to sell to someone who will redevelop it and bring new business to Brookfield’s central business district.
At Brookfield’s committee of the whole meeting on Sept. 23, Dumas was the first to speak to trustees during a discussion where residents were encouraged to give their thoughts on what they would like to see take the place of the disused building, which originally showed movies and live performances from 1915 until it closed in 1952.
Dumas said he and the other members of the new community acting troupe want to turn the building into a dedicated space for the arts in Brookfield. He told trustees that, if the village sees fit and sells them the property, the Glaser Players would honor the building’s initial purpose by bringing theater back to Brookfield while also spotlighting other arts initiatives that the community is interested in.
“Our interest is mostly in theater and plays and musicals, but we’d like to do concerts and dance recitals and comedy,” he said at the meeting. “There’s a lot of interest [from arts groups], and it’s an interesting idea to bring together the past, the present and the future in this one facility.”
As part of the goal, Dumas said the theater would partner with local businesses for concessions. He said the auditorium where performances are hosted would be “modular,” with the stage constructed of four-foot cubes that could be rearranged to suit the needs of whatever organization was using the space.
“Our idea is to set this up in such a way that our imagination would be the only limitation we would have about how the building could be used,” he said. “We feel that that’s really important, creating that space that the community can be proud of, that’s functional and that brings the arts and art programs to the village in a cohesive and combined fashion.”
Meet the Glaser Players
In an interview with the Landmark, Dumas explained that the Glaser Players has existed as a theater troupe in some capacity for about 40 years, though the group’s name is new. Dumas said the group got its start under Riverside resident George Glaser; when he died in 1994, his son, Broadway child actor Darel Glaser, took over the group, which comprised many members of the Riverside Theater Guild focused on children’s productions. After Darel Glaser died in 2022, Dumas said the group decided to name themselves in honor of the Glasers.
While there’s much overlap between the Glaser Players and the Riverside Theater Guild, Dumas said the split between them is twofold. Aside from the obvious difference between children’s theater and adult theater in the age of the actors, Dumas said the Glaser Players named themselves such to avoid taking a village’s name and feeling constricted on where they can perform.
Dumas said the group has been working with Brookfield, specifically Community Development Director Libby Popovic, to look for a permanent space it can acquire for rehearsals and performances.
“The biggest challenge in community theater is the space,” he told the Landmark. “[A production] requires six to eight weeks of pretty much dedicated — you have to dedicate at least a part of the space to it. You have to build a set, and you have to have rehearsals, so [it can be] very difficult.”
While Brookfield’s leads have yet to find the Glaser Players their forever home, Dumas said the village was immediately supportive of them and has remained that way.
Because the group came so close to buying the building in the first place — including a private tour from the previous owner who required members to sign non-disclosure agreements — Dumas said the owner’s decision to take another offer without negotiation “completely caught us off guard” after the group started to feel like everything was lining up for them to reclaim the Brookfield Theater.
But once they heard the property went to the village for eventual redevelopment rather than to a new private owner, he said his surprise turned into awe.
“After the shock, I was really impressed, because I don’t think that’s necessarily what people would have assumed they would have done, and I don’t think that’s the kind of vision that Brookfield’s had,” said Dumas, a Brookfield native. “But it was the right thing to do. It was a brilliant strategy move because, if you want to control something, if you own it, you can’t control it any better than that, right?”
While Brookfield is still in the preliminary stages of deciding what becomes of the Brookfield Theater, Dumas said the Glaser Players plan to submit a formal bid for the property when the time comes.
Outside of trying to bring community theater to Brookfield, Dumas and other Glaser Player leaders said their goal is to help spread the art so anyone of any age can realize their love for theater. He said their work at the Riverside Theater Guild and beyond is often a family affair, with previous child actors who’ve grown up bringing their own children to see the shows. Dumas and his wife even met through community theater and have had their children and grandchildren act in shows.
“I think a lot of people think [theater] is a dying thing. It really isn’t. I mean, it’s still very popular, and that’s, I think, a huge advantage that we have,” Dumas said. “When the village board kept talking about sustainability, I thought, ‘Hey, we’ve been doing this here for 40 years. If that’s not sustainability, I don’t know what is.’”
