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Council celebrates City Theatre’s 100th anniversary
St. Petersburg City Theatre began in 1925 as the Sunshine City Players.
During the St. Petersburg City Council’s meeting Thursday afternoon, Councilmember Lisset Hanewicz read a proclamation acknowledging the 100th anniversary of St. Petersburg City Theatre into the record.
One of the country’s longest continually-operating community theaters, the organization began in 1925 as the Sunshine City Players. From 1933 to 2011, it was known as the St. Petersburg Little Theatre.
The proclamation, signed by Mayor Ken Welch, called SPCT “a definite part of the civic and social life of our community that provides an opportunity for self-expression, growth, and goodwill through the Arts of the Theatre – welcoming, without barrier, all members and ages of the community.”
Councilmembers Corey Givens Jr. and Copley Gerdes commented that they, too, had performed onstage with the Little Theatre as youngsters, and carried fond memories of the experience.
“A lot of people don’t know this,” Givens said, “Hollywood actress Angela Bassett got her start on that stage 50 years ago.” Bassett, an Academy Award nominee for What’s Love Got to Do With It and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, grew up in St. Petersburg and attended local schools.
City Theatre board president Stefanie Lehmann, who spoke during the council meeting, is Associate General Manager at New York’s Lincoln Center. For the theater’s 2026 production of A Christmas Carol, opening Friday, Lehmann wrote an opening scene based on an actual event from City Theatre history.
During World War II, the company performed a “radio theater” version of the Dickens classic, broadcast live over WSUN, St. Petersburg’s only radio station at the time.
Lehmann’s opening scene, a preface to a contemporary “radio theater” performance of A Christmas Carol on the City Theatre stage, is set in 1942 and introduces a cast of theater employees and volunteers – all of whom were real people – as they prepare for the subsequent “broadcast.”
St. Petersburg City Theatre website.
The “historic” radio theater production of “A Christmas Carol” opens Friday and will continue through Dec. 21 at St. Petersburg City Theatre.
