Outrageous dinner theater back at original location But there was a problem, remembered Norman Langill, a longtime Queen Anne resident who directs the shows. The theater on Mercer Street across from the opera house was operating on temporary permits, which had to be repeatedly secured. So, fed up, Langill moved the tent and the production in 2000 to San Francisco, where it continues to this day, he said.
The tent, Palaise Nostalgic, is around a century old, but Langill managed to find a second tent, the Moulin Rouge, and staged ZinZanni shows in it at the location of a former Belltown car dealership beginning in 2002.
But now Langill, his zany troupe and the Moulin Rouge are back at the theater's original location on a five-year lease signed with the Seattle Opera, which now owns the property, he said. The show, "Hearts on Fire," opens tonight, Nov. 28.
THE EUROPEAN CONNECTION
It all started in Barcelona, recounted Langill, who's also president and founder of One Reel, which stages Bumbershoot each year. He was in the Spanish city in 1992 as part of a cultural Olympiad and worked on a trilingual musical about rice farming, said the graduate of the University of Wash-ington's professional-actor program.
Langill was strolling down one of the main drags in Barcelona when he came across a spiegeltent. "I walked into it, and I was transported," he said. "Having done Bumbershoot for so many years, I liked the tent connection."
But the age of the tent also gave it special meaning, according to Langill. "So I felt like the whole theater itself was a big set," he said. That chance encounter later led to a six-year search for the tent, and Langill finally found it in Antwerp, Belgium. He also found the man who owned it, Willy Klessens.
Willy's grandfather, Willem Klessens, built the tents around 1910, and each is made up of more than 4,000 pieces that are assembled without any metal fasteners, according to a Teatro ZinZanni press release.
The Klessens family leases the tents to Langill, and Willy and his son flew over from Belgium to move the tent from Belltown to Queen Anne, Langill said. "They did it in a day, two guys with no tools," he added in some wonderment.
The venue also has a lobby and a bar, but the windows in the lobby were originally part of the sets for a Stephen King horror movie filmed in Seattle. "We are cultural recyclers," Langill grinned.
THE SHOWS
Langill said he gets his acts for Teatro ZinZanni from all over the world, and he's been able to tap into the talent that has appeared at Bumbershoot over the years. Many of the performers are from Europe, which makes sense. "Variety theater is still a big thing in Europe," he said.
But One Reel staged its own vaudeville shows from 1972 to 1983, and that also provided a source of talent for Teatro ZinZanni, Langill said. It's somehow fitting because Seattle is considered to be the home of vaudeville, he said. Vaudeville hit the boards in the Emerald City following the gold rush in the 19th century. "This town thrives on creativity and new ideas," Langill added. "I think it's why it was so receptive [to Teatro ZinZanni]."
There have been 55 versions of the shows so far, and around 900,000 people have seen 3,500 ZinZanni shows in both Seattle and San Francisco since they began, he said. "We change the stars every four months." There are around a dozen performers in each show, and some of the veterans return to perform in new shows, Langill said.
Coming up with new shows is a collaborative process. "We don't start with a script," he explained. Each performer develops his or her own character, Langill said. "Then we improvise into a story," he added. "You have to be on your toes."
Even the wait staff gets involved with the show, Langhill said as the waiters and waitresses did their own version of a rehearsal in the background during the interview. More importantly, some audience members also get involved on a volunteer basis, he said. Nothing happens that really embarrasses the participating audience members, Langill stressed. "We're here to have fun," he said. "It's like going to a party."
Langill is happy to be back in Lower Queen Anne with his show. "I think it's a tremendous neighborhood down here," he said. "It's great to build on [former Seattle Center director] Virginia Anderson's theatre district." While ZinZanni has a five-year lease with the Opera House, Langill wants to stay at the location "for a long time," he said. "We belong here."
Playing at around 90-percent capacity, Teatro ZinZanni has room for about 295 audience members. "We were totally surprised at the response," Langill said. Also surprising is the popularity of the show, given that tickets cost between $114 and $160 each.
Langill isn't really surprised. "We're considered the finest version of this [genre] in the world," he said, adding that a lot of the audience members have returned for a second helping of a show that is "here to take people to another place for a brief time."
Staff reporter Russ Zabel can be reached at or 461-1309.
