EL PORTAL'S NEWEST RESIDENT READY TO GIVE IT A GO IN NOHO.

Byline: - Evan Henerson

Once again, the marquee is lit, subscriptions are being sold, the seats are getting filled, and an occasional starry name is walking through the doors at the intersection of Lankershim and Weddington.

Once again, there's a local theater company's plan to bring entertainment to the NoHo Arts District's largest and historically most-troubled playhouse.

Once again, audiences have a new name to contend with. The venue itself may still be called the El Portal but the resident company is now the San Fernando Valley Playhouse.

``The clearer you can be, the better,'' says James A. Blackman III, the producer and executive director of the San Fernando Valley Playhouse, which kicks off its inaugural season tonight. ``I know it's not original, but it's a playhouse in the San Fernando Valley. No one owned the name, so we took it and went forward.''

Oh, right. And once again, a producer believes that there are enough audiences willing to fill up the 360-seat El Portal to offer a subscription series.

Since the former ``miracle on Lankershim'' reopened as a playhouse in 2000, the theater has been dogged by debt, sound problems, meager audiences and a revolving roster of administrators. Theater companies have come, taken root, produced a season or two, changed their names and vacated, leaving subscribers with unredeemable tickets and wondering who's running the show.

In fact, even as resident companies have come and gone, the theater itself has never been idle. Deborah Downey has leased the venue's 99-seat space for cabaret acts, and Stuart Rogers' Theatre Tribe operates out of the El Portal's studio space. Producers of other live stage acts, negotiating directly with the owners of the building, have brought performances to the main stage, including an engagement of Ed Begley Jr.'s Cesar Chavez musical, ``Cesar and Ruben,'' and ``Wigfield.''

Blackman, who conducted pre-curtain pitches to audiences when he brought a production of ``Always ... Patsy Cline'' to the El Portal last year, professes not to know much about the theater's troubled history.

``I sort of feel like a guy who moved into an apartment formerly occupied by a moron who used to play his stereo too loud,'' says Blackman. ``Our umbrella corporation is clean and stable. We've promised to be good neighbors.''

Say what you will about the colorful Blackman, he's no theater neophyte. The founder and top administrator of the Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities, Blackman programs seasons at both CLOSBC and the nearby Hermosa Beach Playhouse. It's the HBP productions that he will bring to the San Fernando Valley Playhouse for a two-week run.

A former employee of the Reagan administration, Blackman has run musical theater companies at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium and the Santa Barbara Civic Light Opera. CLOSBC operates out of the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, which, Blackman notes, used to be the auditorium of his alma mater, Aviation High School.

Branching into his own back yard - or near it, as Blackman lives in Eagle Rock - was a natural progression, he says.

``The Valley's a killer,'' says Blackman. ``I'm used to the South Bay, where half my demographics are garibaldis, blue whales and dolphins. But they can't come up on shore to subscribe.''

Uh, you want to run that by us one more time?

``The adage is that when you're looking for subscribers, you draw a circle around the theater,'' he explains. ``But in South Bay, I'm so parked up against the ocean that I can only draw half a circle.''

Not that he's doing so badly. Past productions of musicals like ``Crazy for You'' and ``Dreamgirls'' have been multiple winners at the annual Ovation awards, which recognize L.A.-based theater. More important, Blackman's companies have successful track records, say locals who have followed the El Portal's tumultuous financial history.

``He's proven to be a successful and popular producer in Southern California,''' says Ed Gaynes, president of the Valley Theatre League. ``I think the theater community all wishes him continued success in NoHo.''

The opening season kicks off tonight with a run of A.R. Gurney's two-person perennial ``Love Letters'' featuring Debbie Reynolds and John Saxon. Next up, Jason Graae stars in Becky Mode's solo performance, ``Fully Committed.'' (March 24-April 4). Maripat Donovan brings the sequel to ``Late Night Catechism'' - titled ``Catechism II, the Sequel'' - to the SFVP in October, and another solo show, ``Around the World in a Bad Mood,'' based on the memoirs of flight attendant Rene Foss, lands Nov. 10-21.

CAPTION(S):

photo

Photo:

James A. Blackman III, executive director of the San Fernando Valley Playhouse, hopes to revive the flagging fortunes of the El Portal Center for the Arts in North Hollywood.

Evan Yee/Staff Photographer