BOZEMAN, Mont. — At the Ellen Theatre in downtown Bozeman, employees are busy assembling and restoring sets of vintage seats.
“Right under the stage here I saw the dressing rooms from when it was a vaudeville house, and those rooms were packed to the rafters with all sorts of artifacts from the theater,” said John Ludin, executive director of the Ellen.
Those antiques included hundreds of pieces of the theater’s original seating from 1919.
“I remember thinking, first of all, they’re beautiful. And I’m sure people would love to be able to have these someday,” Ludin said. “So we tucked them away, and I knew at some point we would sell them, and this opportunity presented itself when we were closed. And so we did.”
Ludin says they listed about 100 seats for sale last week and sold out within 24 hours.
“I was pleasantly surprised that people really took to it. I knew that a lot of people would like them, and we were happy with how it turned out,” he said.
The money raised from the sale of the seats will go right back into the theater to help keep it going while it’s closed due to the pandemic.
Ludin says prior to COVID-19, the theater was very busy with over 200 events scheduled for the year.
“One of the things that has been a really good silver lining for us with this whole situation is the community has been extremely supportive,” said Ludin, “not just not just monetarily, which is nice, but people calling and saying, ‘Hey, we’re thinking about you guys, we hope you’re doing OK.’”
If you missed out on the seats the first time around, Ludin says don’t worry. They have even more vintage treasures from the theater coming in the new year.
For now, he’s looking ahead, booking events for 2021 and 2022. He’s hopeful the theater’s audience will be full once again.
“We’re looking forward to welcoming all those people back soon,” Ludin said.
