These employees devote their days to setting up for shows and fixing the constant problems that arise in a nearly century-old building, said Max Wagner, who handles community relations for the 83-year-old theater.
“The place was largely ignored for the better part of 50 years,” Wagner added. But no longer. The new management has plunged millions of dollars into The Congress. Most of the improvements are not directly related to entertainment, and include much-needed infrastructure upgrades in the form of new bathrooms and a re-tuned ventilation system.
“But the real genius of the place,” as Wagner put it, is the 48 studio apartments and 12 retail spaces that make The Congress not just a theater but a complex that is likely to survive regardless of what happens in the entertainment industry.
The Congress was built as part of the Lubliner & Trinz family of movie palaces that used to comprise 30 buildings across Chicago. Today only a handful remain. The current owner acquired the theater shortly after the previous management slated the structure for demolition in 2002. The surrounding community banded together to have The Congress declared a Chicago landmark, thus saving it.
The new owner, who prefers not to be named, and his staff have tried ever since to make The Congress something the community can be proud of again, according to Wagner. “The only time you ever have a bad relationship with the community is when you ignore them.”
“One of the fascinating things from a business perspective is that the owner renovated the apartments first,” according to Paul Levin, executive director of the Logan Square Chamber of Commerce. Levin said the best thing the new management has done for the theater and the community at large has been to clean up the “seedy” tenants the complex used to attract. “There are a lot of people who wish it wasn’t there anymore. I’m not one of them.”
Wagner said that the theater strives to respond when Congress patrons cause disturbances. “Noise and traffic there’s only so much I can do. But trash? You think someone from a show put trash in your yard, call me. I’ll send someone to clean it up. What we can manage we do.”
Juana Galvan, 26, has lived behind the theater on Rockwell Street for 15 years. “I haven’t really seen change as far as the Congress. Sometime it is too loud and people park where they’re not supposed to park but the only thing that’s changed is the parking here is permit now.” Galvan said she rarely attends events at The Congress.
“People always ask me, ‘When’s someone going to save this place?’” Wagner said. “What they don’t realize is it’s already been saved.”
