by blake herzog
For 55 years, the imposing red-brick structure at 208 N. Marina St. has been the heart and soul of community theater in Prescott.
Initially gifted to the Prescott Fine Arts Association (PFAA) by charter member Norma Hazeltine, the former Sacred Heart Church and rectory were transformed into a community theater and its offices. It gave locals the chance to step out of their comfort zone and work in a collaborative environment to produce musicals, dramas, comedies and programs ranging from Reader’s Theatre to Teen Summer Stock to Family Theatre.
The campus was operated as Prescott Center for the Arts and more recently as Suze’s Prescott Center for the Arts, but the PFAA was faced with an unsustainable financial situation after a third structure with a black-box theater was added in 2023, and curtains fell on the final production in September 2024.
In the wake of the closure a group of local arts leaders, business owners and other community members came together with a mission: “To save the historic facilities and preserve community theater in Prescott for generations to come.”
By November the group had the financial backing of a new benefactor, 4th Wall Productions, and was able to start making the dream a reality. The facilities were collectively renamed The Hazeltine.
“It took us a while, we brought people together, finally found somebody, and their goal is the property will be put into a trust, and it will be a theater campus, forever, it can never be used for anything else,” board president and Prescott restauranteur Barry Barbe says.
He says 4h Wall Productions operates as a nonprofit 501(c)3 and currently is planning its first full season, after focusing on fundraising activities and renovations throughout December and January.
“It’s been an exhausting passion project, but very fulfilling,” Barbe says. “Our goal is to create the best facility possible with sound and light, everything else and make it accessible to the whole community. We’re able to host events through rentals and things like that, so we have other theater groups that will be able to use the facility.”
4th Wall is planning The Hazeltine’s first full season, with full-scale quarterly productions throughout 2025. The first, Putting it Together, was scheduled as of press time to open Feb. 5. This musical revue features the songs of Stephen Sondheim, with a five-member cast taking the audience through the challenges, trials, and anticipation of putting on a theatrical production.
Barbe says this will be followed the last weekend in February with another performing group, Emerson Theater Collaborative, mounting a production of Driving Miss Daisy
to commemorate Black History Month. The next week another event will mark International Women’s Month in March.
Monthly Coffee with the Crew events will bring the public together with The Hazeltine’s team. Barbe says 4th Wall is hoping to bring back the summer stock and family theater programs the Prescott Center for the Arts was also known for as early as this summer.
For more information on upcoming events, tickets, auditions, volunteer opportunities and fundraisers visit www.the-hazeltine.com and the 4th Wall Productions Facebook page. Anyone with questions can email info@4thwallprescott.org or call 928.493.2141.
