To renovate or to demolish? That is the question City of Miami Beach commissioners are asking themselves when it comes to The Fillmore Miami Beach at the Jackie Gleason Theater, the beloved yet deteriorating performing arts venue.
In the ‘50s, when it was known as the Miami Beach Auditorium, it was home to TV’s “The Jackie Gleason Show.” After it was renovated and renamed in the mid-’70s, the venue hosted touring Broadway shows, Elvis Costello concerts, boxing matches and a Madonna residency. The Fillmore has survived demolition discussions in the past, and in 2022, after Miami Beach voters approved $159 million in bonds to invest in local cultural institutions, $29 million was allocated to renovate it.
Now, commissioners are weighing the pros and cons of using the $29 million to upgrade the existing building or start anew.
At a city Finance and Economic Resiliency Committee meeting on Friday, commissioners were eager to discuss the future of The Fillmore with Live Nation, the entertainment company that operates the venue. Though conversations on how to revamp the aging building are in early stages, commissioners showed interest in putting the $29 million toward demolishing the theater and building a new state-of-the-art facility.
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Commissioner Alex Fernandez stressed that the building deals with flooding issues and lacks the technology needed to attract high quality productions. As an older building, The Fillmore is subject to a recertification process every 10 years to address structural issues, the commission noted. Discussions on The Fillmore have revived as construction on the 800-room Grand Hyatt Miami Beach Convention Center Hotel are underway nearby. The venue closed for a year when construction on the hotel began.
“The type of revamp that will be required, the type of investment that will be required, to make the facility competitive again, it does beg the question: Is it worth investing that type of money in such an aging facility? That’s an option,” Fernandez said during the meeting. “Or is it a better longterm investment to build a new facility?”
Fernandez asked Trevor Ralph, Live Nation vice president of regional venue operations, how long investing $29 million into The Fillmore would “extend the lifespan” of the building.
"I don’t think it extends the lifespan much at all,” Ralph said. “I think it’s a Band-Aid, quite frankly.”
Later in the meeting, Commissioner David Suarez said, “I certainly don’t feel comfortable spending $29 million to put a Band-Aid on a building only to not really know what’s going to happen five years from now. I think that’s just a waste of funds.”
In May 2023, Live Nation presented the committee plans to build a new theater, according to a meeting memo. But those discussions didn’t move forward at the time.
Commissioners who have been hesitant to radically change the theater in the past have since changed their minds.
Commissioner Kristen Rosen Gonzalez began her comments with a story about a recent trip she took to London where she saw a performance at The Bridge Theatre, the first new commercial theater built in London in 80 years. It cost 11.6 million pounds, about $14 million, to build. Rosen Gonzalez was so impressed by the venue and its technology, she wondered why Miami Beach can’t have a theater just as nice.
“I am a preservationist, I love our historic district, but we can make something so stunning [...] and we have the money to do it in Miami Beach,” she said. “I overwhelmingly approve, but I want this to be that type of theater. It has to be something that is so spectacular, with $30 million, I can’t see how we won’t be able to do it.”
Though Commissioner Tanya Bhatt has been “reluctant to part ways with the Gleason,” her opinion has changed, too.
“Even if we inject $29 million into upgrading the theater, we will not pass our 10 year recertification unscathed. I’m sure it’ll do very well, but there will still be more that needs to happen,” Bhatt said. “Having lived in a money pit myself, it’s really frustrating when you spend an ungodly amount of money and finish the work successfully and it looks and feels exactly the way it did before.”
Lyle Stern, the Lincoln Road Business Improvement District president, spoke during the meeting to show his support for the commissioner’s ideas as a Miami Beach resident.
“I love this conversation,” he said. “I think unlocking the potential of this real estate for the longterm good and value of the citizens of the city, our residents, our tourists, everything going on around it, is one of the most spectacular conversations I’ve heard in a long time.”
It is unclear when further preliminary discussions on the Fillmore’s future and possible negotiations with Live Nation will take place. The company has an agreement with the city to operate the venue for the next few years.
Commissioner Joe Magazine said he would like to see what Live Nation comes up with.
“Show us the coolest thing,” Magazine said. “For the cultural epicenter of our neighborhood, show us the coolest thing you could provide Miami Beach.”
This story was produced with financial support from individuals and Berkowitz Contemporary Arts in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners, as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The Miami Herald maintains full editorial control of this work.
