Paradise Playhouse Dinner Theatre and Events Center in the News

From the Excelsior Springs Standard

By ERIC COPELAND
Managing Editor

 
    After two and a half years sitting empty, Paradise Playhouse will once again stage dinner theater performances.

     The venue, located at 101 Spring St., will be under new management starting Oct. 1. A new season of shows is scheduled to begin in November.

    Jim Dickerson is the man behind the plan. He’s worked out a lease for now, in order to get the dinner theater up and running as soon as possible, and may be purchasing the building in the future.

     Dickerson, of Kansas City, is connected to Excelsior Springs through his wife’s family. Sarah Ellerman Dickerson is a 1992 alumna of Excelsior Springs; it so happens that it’s because of his wife’s family, as well, that he’s gotten involved in Paradise Playhouse.

     Dickerson said earlier this year, his wife’s grandmother was moving into the Oaks Apartments and he saw the back of the dinner theater across South Street.

     “I was asking about it, and my wife told me how successful it had been,” Dickerson said. “I thought I might be interested, so I called to check on it.”

     Dickerson is in the business management field, and also provides assistance to struggling businesses. Paradise Playhouse seemed to be an extension of that idea.

     “I started asking around, and heard over and over about how successful it was, but then the owners retired and moved to Hawaii,” he said. “I thought it was a shame that it would just be sitting empty.”

     He met with the broker for the building and was told that it was in “perfect condition.” Having acquired buildings before—and knowing that “perfect condition” means different things—he was astonished to get inside and find out that Paradise Playhouse’s situation was, indeed, pristine.

     “I had no idea something like that existed in Excelsior Springs,” he said.

     He brought back some of his business associates, including a food service manager, and they recognized Marty Williams, a past Paradise Playhouse director, in one of the photographs at the venue. Williams is a well-known photographer in the Kansas City area, and he was able to provide Dickerson with some contact info for the “old crowd” at Paradise.

     “We started going through what worked, and what didn’t, and what people liked, and what they didn’t like,” Dickerson said. “I was constantly surprised by how many people, not just in Excelsior Springs but in other places, knew and loved Paradise Playhouse.”