Elephant Eye Theatrical

Through its partnership with Elephant Eye Theatrical (as a founding member of Five Cent Productions), Pittsburgh CLO is working with other musical theater companies across the nation to find new and innovative ways to develop material that can play not only in the Pittsburgh market, but on the world stage as well.

The costs of an out-of-town try out are prohibitive for many new musicals, forcing them to begin previews on Broadway with work still ahead of them. However, producers and directors admit that the chance to develop and fine-tune a new production away from the eyes of New York audiences is one of the most important things afforded to any new production. The company finds and initiates projects, assembles creative teams, funds the ongoing evolution of the projects and serves as the projects’ lead producer.

Elephant Eye was initially founded by producers Stuart Oken and Michael Leavitt, along with five original non-profit regional companies known as Five Cent Productions, including

• The Pittsburgh CLO and The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust (shared) of Pittsburgh, PA;
• The Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts of Hartford, CT;
• The Citi Performing Arts Center (formally the Wang Center) of Boston, MA;
• Ordway Center for the Performing Arts of St. Paul, MN; and
• The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts of Philadelphia, PA.

Joining forces with Elephant Eye and Five Cent Productions are fellow non-profits: The Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in West Palm Beach, FL; The Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center in Tampa, FL; The Carnival Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, FL; Proctors Theatre in Schenectady, NY; The Victoria Theatre Association in Dayton, OH; The New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, NJ; Theater of the Stars and The Fox Theatre (shared) in Atlanta, GA.The commercial presenters who have come on board include Broadway In Chicago, a Nederlander/Live Nation partnership in Chicago, IL; Dancap Productions, producer Aubrey Dan’s new initiative based in Toronto, Canada; and Starmax, a leading entertainment organization in Seoul, Korea.

Exciting projects currently in development are The Addams Family, Bruce Lee: Journey to the West, The Boys Are Coming Home and Saved.