Beloved Bay Area Children's Theater to close effective immediately

BERKELEY, Calif. - A longtime and beloved Bay Area performing arts company has abruptly announced its closure.

The Berkeley-based Bay Area Children's Theater had been in operation for nearly 20 years, bringing thousands of children to the stage where they fell in love with theater.

All forthcoming shows, classes, and camps have been canceled, effective immediately.

KTVU spoke with board president Cristina Clark Bloodgood, who said she is heartbroken about the closure.

She said that the pandemic just made it too difficult to survive.

"Not being allowed to have patrons in the theater, not being able to get revenue to move forward was the immediate challenge," she said on Thursday. "The cost of the Bay Area, restarting in the Bay Area, bringing actors in. It's just to go from a standstill of you're not allowed to have any patrons to restarting is effectively restarting an entire company."

The theater group acknowledged that the closure would result in many un-resolved camps and classes and asked for patience as it worked to close out all relations in a timely manner