Berkeley's Central Works theater to close - California News Beep

Edwin Jacobs and Monique Crawford perform in Central Works’ satirical 2023 play “Mondragola,” set in Niccolo Machiavelli’s Florence. The theater is closing with its directors set to retire. Credit: Robbie Sweeney

Central Works, the 36-year-old Berkeley-based theater company, is coming to a close after the end of its current season, as co-directors Gary Graves and Jan Zvaifler are set to retire.

The pair tried to find someone to keep the theater’s legacy alive, but “it’s a very demanding job,” said Graves, 70, in an interview with Berkeleyside. “ We’re a very small organization and we do lots of different things in order to keep it going and keep the overhead low so that we can do new plays.”

In 2002, Central Works established residency at the Julia Morgan-designed Berkeley City Club. The club’s small theater — a mere 50 seats — makes for intimate and exciting theater, but also “really hinders your earning potential,” said Graves.

Central Works Theater performs in the Berkeley City Club, designed by architect Julia Morgan who also designed Hearst Castle. Credit: Gary Graves

About a third of Central Works’ income came from ticket sales, a third from grants, and another third from individual donations.

The closure of the company marks the loss of yet another treasured theater in Berkeley in recent years, including Aurora Theater in 2025, and Bay Area Children’s Theatre and TheatreFirst in 2023.

Zvaifler founded Central Works in 1990 along with Søren Oliver as an actor-driven ensemble.

“There used to be a lot more [acting] work in Berkeley and a lot more out-of-work actors,” said Graves, who became co-director in 1997. “It was not unusual back then or even now for actors to band together to say, ‘While we’re looking for work and in between jobs, why don’t we make our own theater?’”

Gary Graves, co-director. Credit: A. Smithee

Jan Zvaifler, co-director. Credit: S. Strazzante

When Graves joined the team, Central Works began producing only new plays, many of which were created using a collaborative development process called the Central Works Method. The company, which refers to itself as “the New Play Theater,” has created 81 world premieres to date.

Graves said that performing only new plays is the “most difficult business plan for a theater.”

“Typically, the way the theater operates is people go to see the play that’s been identified as the hot new play, or they go to see the classic,” said Graves. “So it’s very, very difficult to build an audience and sustain a theater company just doing new plays.”

The Central Works performance space at the Berkeley City Club includes a fireplace, beamed ceiling and chandeliers. Credit: Gary Graves

But the small theater has had a big impact on Bay Area theater. Its productions have won numerous awards including multiple San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle and Theater Bay Area awards. In 2006 East Bay Express named Central Works the Best Small Theater Company, calling it “theater for people who want to stretch their brains and have their assumptions challenged.” Earlier this year its production of “Push/Pull” by Harry Davis won the prestigious Will Glickman Award, which honors the best new play in the Bay Area.

Central Works was founded just a year before Aurora Theater in Berkeley. And now Central Works is closing just a year after Aurora. These are just two of several theaters shuttering across the region.

Asked about the reason behind these closures, Graves points to a few things. There’s the “Covid effect,” where patrons stopped going to the theater during the pandemic and have been slow to return. There’s the “Netflix effect,” where the sheer amount of content that a person can stream at home is hard for theater to compete with. He also said that theater “feels a little antiquated to a lot of people, particularly younger people,” which is a barrier to both the influx of new talent and the growth of new audiences.

“And then lastly, there’s an ideological capture in the theater that has alienated much of the base audience for the theater,” said Graves. “And they’re pretty sick and tired of the same ideological message that much of contemporary theater has been beating them over the head with.”

Or as he put it more succinctly: “ Theater went woke and is now broke.”

Not that the work of Central Works isn’t political. Far from it. The final two plays it will produce, The Prince Part 1 (world premiere number 80) and The Prince Part 2 (world premiere number 81), were written by Graves and explore the life and times of Niccolo Machiavelli, whose book “The Prince,” is a sort of “handbook for tyrants,” according to Graves. And even though the subject matter is a 16th century philosopher, these are not history plays, according to Graves.

“It’s a big, long story with a dedicated and brilliant bunch of actors,” he said. “I hope it will engage people’s thinking about the nature of power and the predicament that we’re in as a country.”

The Prince Part 1 and Part 2 will be performed in rotation from July 18-September 6 at the Berkeley City Club.

Central Works, 2315 Durant Ave. 2nd floor, Berkeley. Phone: 510-558-1381. Connect via Instagramand Facebook.

Berkeley’s Central Works theater to close

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