Peforming arts center gets Hanover name after $2m gift
A planned 2,300-seat performance arts center in downtown Worcester will now be called The Hanover Theatre for the Performing Arts, after that company’s largest-ever gift of $2 million.
The center, currently under renovation, will be housed at the former Loew’s Poli Palace Theatre in Federal Square. It’s slated to open next December.
When finished the new hall will be equipped to handle large-scale Broadway shows, concerts, recitals, dance and comedy acts and other special events. The Hanover donation is the largest ever for the company, and the largest for the project. Other major donors include trustee Mary DeFeudis, who gave $500,000 and Sovereign Bank, which gave $150,000.
At a ceremony inside the gutted building announcing the name change last week, City Manager Mike O’Brien said that the Hanover Theatre would generate $40 million of direct and indirect annual investment when it opens.
"It will be an economic engine for downtown," O’Brien says.
Troy Siebels, the executive director of the center praised the efforts to build the center, which he says will rival the Boston Opera House. It will bring in 2,000 people a day, 200 nights a year, he says.
"Hanover’s gift is monumental, and I hope the extraordinary gift will encourage other’s to give in an extraordinary way," Siebels says.
Hanover CEO Fred Eppinger, speaking to the crowd, recalled warmly going the original theatre while growing up in Spencer.
"This will change the image of Worcester," he says. "This isn’t about a building. This about a building a city with pride in itself."
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