Artistic director finds home at Aurora’s Paramount

By Susan Dibble

sdibble@dailyherald.com

“It’s a beauty,” said Jim Corti, as he shows a visitor the 1,888-seat Paramount Theatre in Aurora, where he became artistic director in January.

A building as grand as the 80-year-old Paramount, constructed in the art deco style of the 1930s, deserves shows as breathtaking as their venue, Corti believes. He’s here to do just that.

The award-winning director, choreographer and actor was brought on board to create the first locally produced Broadway shows in the theater’s history. “My Fair Lady,” directed by Corti himself, debuts in September, followed by “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” in November, “A Chorus Line” in January and “Hair” in March. Each show will run three weeks.

Corti is putting together the directors, set designers, costume designers and actors for each production.

“It’s a huge job,” he said. “There’s nowhere else I’d rather be, I have to say, as daunting as it is.”

There was a time when Corti never would have imagined himself in such a position. The Trenton, N.J., native has spent his entire adult life in the theater — in Chicago, New York and on national tour. He’s never had his own office before, he noted, and “gypsy” was a title he wore with pride.

“This is very different from the idea of moving around,” he said. “This is about establishing a foundation.”

New direction

Corti said he’s ready to do the foundation-building and, in this, it seems his and the Paramount’s stars aligned.

The theater will continue to host a variety of short-run musical acts, comedy, dance, movies and family shows, but bringing in traveling Broadway shows simply has become too expensive, said Tim Rater, who became Paramount’s executive director last summer.

Rater explored other options and concluded Paramount needed to produce its own Broadway shows, and looked for the right person to do that.

“If I hadn’t found Jim, who knows if we would be producing Broadway right now,” he said. “We would not produce Broadway if we could not produce Broadway that I thought would represent the theater well.”

Corti — winner of multiple Jeff awards for directing, choreography and acting — is at home on both Broadway and in Chicago theater. His credits include the New York casts of “Ragtime,” “A Chorus Line” and “Candide,” as well national tours of “Urinetown,” “Cabaret” and “Dancin’.”

He’s worked as director and choreographer in many of the major theaters in the Chicago area. Two of the productions he directed — “Cabaret” at Drury Lane Oakbrook Terrace and “O Coward!” at Writer’s Theatre in Glencoe — were named to the Chicago Tribune’s “Top 10 list of 2009.”

“Aida,” which he directed at Drury Lane, just closed, and he’s doing the choreography for “Grease” at the American Theater Company on Chicago’s North Side.

But directing is what he loves best, Corti said.

“I think it’s the way I can do the most for the most. Working with actors, directors and designers, you touch a lot of lives,” he said. “The thrill, to me, is how you can have an expectation and have it surpassed because of the contributions of others.”

For that to happen, a director must be a good listener, Corti said.

“To make sure you hear everyone else can make such a difference in a piece of work,” he said.

Corti returned to Chicago three years ago after having spent the previous 10 years in New York.

“This does feel like home,” he said. “There’s an honesty to the work in Chicago that I find distinctive.”

Dennis Zacek, retiring artistic director at Victory Gardens, said he encouraged Corti’s return to the city. Zacek was Corti’s teacher when the latter was an undergraduate student at Loyola University, and has remained a friend and mentor.

“I think he’s a genius when it comes to the world of musical theater. I think they (the Paramount) are fortunate to have him,” Zacek said. “He’s a tireless individual, highly committed to every projects at hand and a consummate professional.”

Downtown Aurora

Corti said the Paramount’s Broadway shows will be fitted to the theater and its audience. For instance, all the shows will be accompanied by a full orchestra rather than an electronic keyboard, as often is done today.

“It will be a very full sound. The Paramount really deserves that,” he said. “It’s such a large venue and beautiful venue that I felt that it was very important we fill it with music, and live music.”

The shows themselves were chosen after consultation with Paramount staff, he said.

“I think those four productions are very highly suited to the audience here,” he said.

Jim Dardenne, a set designer from New York, is here to work on “My Fair Lady” and “Chorus Line,” and Corti has lined up other well-respected names as directors and designers for all the shows.

“We have great talent in every department,” he said. “I’m very pleased.”

The Paramount is encouraging area residents to check out the Broadway productions by offering the first 10,000 subscribers packages ranging in price from $69.80 to $93.80 for all four shows. So far, 8,000 subscriptions have been sold, with Aurora Mayor Tom Weisner buying the first.

City officials hope the Paramount’s success will contribute to the continuing revitalization of Aurora’s downtown. To that end, Corti said he’s prepared to leave his one- to two-hour commute from the South Side of Chicago to move to Aurora.

“I think I have to walk the walk,” he said. “It’s important for me to really know the downtown.”

Corti said he wants to reach out to downtown businesses and local colleges, as well as find other ways to build an audience for the Paramount.

“I realize it’s going to take a while,” he said. “I’m also hoping to find a way to reach out to people who perhaps haven’t been to theater before.”

Life’s a stage

Theater offers something movies, TV or computer-generated entertainment can’t, Corti said.

“I think there’s great excitement to walking into a theater, hearing an overture, a curtain going up that can’t compare to anything else,” he said.

Corti became addicted to that excitement early on. Born to blue collar, Italian parents, he grew up in a home filled with music and dance. His father wasn’t part of community theater, but somehow thought his son should be.

“My father brought me to my first audition,” he said.

From the time he played Oliver in his high school musical, Corti was hooked.

“It’s an elixir. It’s a drug. Like any addict, you try to repeat it. You have to have it again,” he said. “I think that’s what defines the highest caliber of artist. They’re always hungry. No matter how successful they are, they’re always hungry to for the next project.”

Theater has its share of egoism and pettiness, Corti acknowledged, but he said it also offers a sense of fulfillment that’s hard to match.

“You’re working with your gift, and you’re working with artists and working with something so ephermal, so elusive, it becomes palatable to the audience,” he said.

Joking that he feels like a priest in a temple, Corti has devoted himself to the stage for 40 years. Single, he admits envy of those who have a home and family, but said that life never seemed meant for him.

“I don’t know how I would have time to do anything else,” he said. “It’s probably why I’m here — I can give it my all.”

Corti says he hopes to keep his hand in Chicago theater, but productions at the Paramount are his first priority.

“The idea of having an artistic home is very important to me now,” he said. “I don’t think I realized how important it was to me until I had this opportunity. Now I feel a huge responsibility to make good on it.”

For details on the Paramount and its shows, visit paramoutaurora.com.