Banking on KC – Jeff Fortier and Larry Sells of Uptown Theater
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Kelly Scanlon:
Welcome to Banking on KC. I'm your host, Kelly Scanlon. Thank you for joining us. With us on this episode is Jeff Fortier, the Co-Owner of Uptown Theater and President and Co-Owner of Mammoth. Also joining us to give us a little bit of the historical background is the former owner, Larry Sells. Welcome to both of you.
Larry Sells:
Hello. Thank you, Kelly.
Kelly Scanlon:
Excited to have you. The Uptown Theater, lots of people pass it. They see the marquee. It's an impressive building, one of our Gems. In fact, it's known as an atmospheric theater and it's one of the few that are left in the country, so I have to know what's an atmospheric theater?
Larry Sells:
Well, the theater was designed so you'd feel like you're in an outdoor garden and you were living near a Mediterranean villa, but it had skies that had little twinkling lights in them. It had clouds that came across because of machines that they had. They had flying birds. They had trellises on the side. They had a little balcony on the side, and underneath that, there were benches and fountains and everything so that you felt that you were in an outside atmospheric area.
Kelly Scanlon:
And they still have some of that remaining, some of that feel remaining. I know I've been in there before. I've never seen birds fly around, but-
Larry Sells:
They still have the statues. The architect, John Eberson, who is from Austria, just happened to have a plant that produced statues. We've done a good job over the last 10 years restoring some of those items.
Kelly Scanlon:
It has an illustrious history. In addition to having such a wonderful architecture and atmosphere, the history itself is quite colorful. It opened in 1928, I believe. It had been started, a few years old, so it's not quite a hundred years old. And at the time, it was considered Kansas City's premier entertainment spot and you got a lot of first-run movies. I believe you said earlier that you broke the grip on some of the earlier theaters that were in town when it opened.
Larry Sells:
Yeah. There were 13 theaters downtown and they were large and very ornate, but you had to get downtown to see them. We were the first theater of that class, which we call a first class theater, to be in the suburbs at 37th and Broadway. We were in the suburbs. And we were in the suburbs, and one of the things they really pushed was that they had great parking. So if you came down there, somebody would come out and get your car and park it on one of the side streets, which was much easier than downtown, but we're also on a streetcar line and that was very important for them. But we're considered the working person's theater and the first one to break that. Later on, we became the Disney Theater, which of course attracted people all the time. So if you wanted to see a Disney theater the first time it played... I mean, a movie, you had to come to the Uptown Theater.
Kelly Scanlon:
Because some of the celebrities actually used to come and come up on stage when their films were being played there. So tell us about some of the-
Larry Sells:
A little unknown guy that was there for a couple weeks was Bob Hope, but we had a lot of horses too, so we had to be careful what was on the stage. I wasn't around back then.
Jeff Fortier:
Gene Autry, Roy Rogers. A lot of the-
Larry Sells:
Shirley Temple was there. Joey Brown, Tom Mix and his horse. Gene Autry and his horse. I don't know if Roy Rogers brought his horse, but there were a lot of cowboy movies back then that were very popular and they liked to have animals on there. There was also a theater organ that came up out of the stage itself, and that organ loft was above the area where they had the outdoor garden, but you would have a lot of entertainment, singers, and bands and things that mixed in with the just regular movies. And also, it was a big deal for kids. Parents would come and drop their kids off at 11 o'clock and pick them up in five or six, seven hours and they'd take their blankets and sit on the floor in front and watch the movies so it was good for everybody.
But when the depression hit, things were bad for everybody, but usually people would scrape together that nickel where they could come to the movies, so they were able to survive for a while. But they also started at that time to start doing weddings and other outside things, so maybe seven families would get together, pool their money and come to the Uptown and have seven weddings together. Interesting that later on, after we restored the Uptown and we were struggling to find anything to generate money, we started doing a lot of weddings. Sometimes we'd have four or five in the different rooms in the theater, so history sometimes is a circle.
Kelly Scanlon:
So you had a great run there with first-rate movies, very family-oriented. The kids would come watch all of the different movies, and then you hit a period in the 60s and 70s where the focus changed to live music.
Larry Sells:
Well, it did, and then one of the reasons was because of a person here in Kansas City who started doing multiple theater chains. They'd have four theaters, or five theaters, or eight-plex, and so these standalone theaters couldn't survive and they're too big. They were inefficient, and the other places would undercut their prices all the time. So it was just like an old relic that was sitting there and it was too hard to maintain for movies, so they started doing other things. They started having plays and playhouse, and they would bring in other type of events, but mostly they went to concerts and they started rocking out and started having fun. And there were quite a number of people that came through. U2 came through and played before 400 people. I remember years later when they were playing the big auditorium, they mentioned the Uptown Theater three times.
Kelly Scanlon:
Eventually, though, it closed for a period of, I want to say, 5, 6, 7 years and then you got involved. So, tell us about how you brought it back.
Larry Sells:
Well, it did close. It was repositioned and opened up in 1979 with Count Basie being the person that came in and kicked it off. And in fact, I was appointed to Land Trust for Jackson County, and it was during that time that the theater was attempted to be sold on the courthouse steps for 30 or $60,000 and nobody would pay 30 or $60,000 for it.
Kelly Scanlon:
Wow.
Larry Sells:
So it came to Land Trust, which I was the head of. And for two years, two years, I tried to sell that nationally and internationally, and you could have bought it for $1. And after two years, there was a group called Save Up, which had a lot of people that are still around Kansas, City, Butch Rigby and people that are still in the business, John Ship and others. And they tried to get some support for it, and they came to me and suckered me in. So, eventually, what I did was I resigned my position so that I could put in an offer on the theater, and we in fact made an offer of $75,000 even though you could have bought it for a dollar.
Kelly Scanlon:
How did you bring it back? I mean, I know there was a lot of work to do on the building, but how did you sell it back to the Kansas City public and to acts?
Larry Sells:
Well, that's a long story because I didn't know anything. I had no intention of doing that. I got the building because I had to drive by it every day on the way from work. But what we did is we got it and we wanted to stop it from falling apart, and so we had a lot of the neighbors that would come in and do voluntary work and do that, but I was also on land clearance for redevelopment and I knew how to do a public-private partnership. So ultimately, we got land clearance redevelopment involved in it. We got TIF involved in it so we could sell some bonds. So this is where I started learning things, which was how much I didn't know. And I just said for one thing, if I'm going to have concerts there, then I know how to do that. You just call up the people, tell them you want them there at a certain date and that you'll pay them so much money and then they'll come and do what you tell.
So we got ahold of another guy who wasn't quite as naive, and that was Jeff Fortier. Jeff came in, started learning, expanding the trade of what he was already doing, and turned out to be pretty good at it. And when we started getting concerts and people, and then I came up with the idea of the weddings and other events, and we ended up with five different rooms and six different rooms. Sometimes we would have five weddings going at the same time.
Kelly Scanlon:
So Jeff, here you sit today still the exclusive producer, I believe, of the acts that come to the Uptown. Tell us about when you'd hooked up here with Larry and what did you do to start getting things turned around and like I said earlier, how did you resell it to Kansas City and to the folks you were trying to get to book?
Jeff Fortier:
So this was in '97, and at that point, there had been a history of events playing Memorial Hall and Memorial Hall's a good room, but it didn't have the rigging capabilities. It didn't have the amenities backstage and it didn't have the character and it was big. It was 3,000 seats. What made the Uptown really special was that at 2,400 seats, you were small and intimate, but if you did it as 1,600 seats at the floor only, you could produce an event so it had a lot of flexibility. In addition, when we did seated events, whether they were comedians, or classic rock shows, or events that really are a little more catered to an older demographic, capacity then was 1,500 seats seated for the whole theater. So when we came in, we started to do seated GA and half house, so we had three different capacities that allowed us to be extremely diverse in our booking. And Memorial Hall, at that point, had one that changed everything. So as we started to book the shows, we started to win people over on the experience. I mean, I got to give a lot of credit to Larry and the team that was involved in the Uptown during that '97 to 2022. They maintained it, and the thing about these theaters is that it's kind of like a painting. It's a piece of art, but you have to maintain it. Otherwise, it doesn't last. There is just a way that you have to maintain a theater and it's not a club. Sure, we're doing live events, but you want to maintain a level of reinvestment. You want to maintain the backstage experience for the artist. You want the fans and the customers to have the best experience, and so you constantly have to adapt to new technologies. You've got to be innovative, and you've got to really have your community and appreciation of all the different cultures that represent everyone in Kansas City. And so one night you're maybe doing an event that is a younger hip-hop event for the younger community, all of them under the age of 21. Then the next day, you've got a rock show. Then the week after, you've got a classic rock show. A couple days later, there's two comedians. Then the next day, you've got an Indie rock band. Then a couple days later, you're booking something that is Prog rock or you're booking something that is K-pop. I mean, the Uptown's calendar is very diverse, and I think over time, you build on that. I will say that there are other venues in Kansas City with the Midland and the Folly and the Kauffman. As you're navigating all of those venues, the Kauffman, Knuckleheads, there's certainly something there for everyone, and it is very rare that there is a town as big as Kansas City that can handle that many theaters and live music events.
I think everyone has their niche. We've been very fortunate that everyone plays well in the sandbox, and I'd like to think the return of the Uptown, along with the redevelopment of the Midland and some of the other theaters in Kansas City has really given Kansas City a shot in the arm that I think a lot of times gets overlooked. I mean, the Uptown isn't just a theater in Midtown. It allows everything around it to flourish other bars, the restaurants. Every time that there's an event, if there's seven, eight events, usually people are going out before an event and after an event.
Larry Sells:
That was one of the selling points that we had when we went before land clearance and the TIF commission was what we were going to do for the neighborhood, and we became a district that ran all the way down to Westport and it was a fight to get those things done, and here we're trying to bring this nice piece of art back to life. We got it going and we brought in some of that public money, and then we threw more and more of our own money and then more and more of our own money and then some more of our money. And after 28 years, we said, "How much more do we have to put in?" And we said, "Jeff is going to take it. Here, Jeff, take it."
Jeff Fortier:
Well, I think there's some truth to that, but I think the trick is can you operate and manage it in a way that you can maximize all the different opportunities that the Uptown has to offer for the community and at the same time maintain the building for the next generation?
Kelly Scanlon:
That's so refreshing to hear. So many people are so focused on the here and now and the fact that you're focused on the present, but you feel like you're a steward almost.
Jeff Fortier:
Well, there's no doubt. I mean, if you look at all of the old theaters throughout the country, they're either part of a trust organization, they've been passed through family members or they've sold once every 30 years. It's very rare that you have the opportunity to buy a theater. We've just been fortunate to have a 30-year relationship with Larry, and so we had a long history and I think that although there were a lot of people interested in becoming the next steward, we were fortunate enough to have the support of the ownership group, and we were blessed to be able to take over the responsibilities of the Uptown Theater.
Larry Sells:
Several of the people said that it was a deal of the heart and that's why it was going, but we got to meet a lot of people. I learned the business. We had Senator Obama there, we had President Obama there, we had John McCain there. We had all kinds of political people there from Right to Left to Libertarian and in between. We were always a free speech venue and Jeff has carried that on, and so it's turned out to be a pretty good place and we didn't want to sell it to anybody other than Jeff because we wanted to carry that on. That's important to us and so far, it's working out.
Kelly Scanlon:
You mentioned the weddings, but there's some other things that go on as well at the Uptown these days besides the live events and the weddings. What else are you equipped to handle?
Jeff Fortier:
There's a lot of private events. There's a lot of parties. Rainy Day Books has come in for years to have speakers. I think it's very challenging when you have the amount of players that are in Kansas City trying to produce different types of events and experiences for the community. We're trying to grow what we do at the Uptown strategically, and wise, and respectfully. A lot of times you see people come in or they build a new building or they come into a market and it becomes a competitive situation, and I think most people don't understand the behind-the-scenes. I think for the most part, everyone in Kansas City, whether it's the Midland or the Kauffman, everyone is pretty respectful of everyone else's business. We've been all been fortunate that we all work well together, and I think we're very fortunate to have the support of the community the way we do.
Because of these venues, I think they've helped support the restaurants. I think they've helped support the bars. There is a connection culturally between live music and going out. And I think if you're 23 and you're looking to move somewhere, it's really nice to have a city like Kansas City where pretty easy shot to the airport. Traffic's not that bad. You can actually still afford to live here, and you've got all the amenities, any city around. We have more outdoor music venues than Minneapolis, St. Louis. We can give Chicago a run for their money. There's five here. And then if you take a look at as far as venues above 1,000 seats, we've got 11. That is not normal. So the fact that we have that support and the fact that people will drive here from Wichita, from Nebraska-
Kelly Scanlon:
So it's really become a regional draw?
Jeff Fortier:
It's been that way in my opinion since at least the past 20 years, and I think there was a period of time where I think Lawrence, Kansas carried the torch of live music for this region. And I think Kansas City has been doing that for a long time, and mainly because of the diversity of the venues and also because of the diversity of the bookings and the opportunities that so many people have to come have an experience.
Kelly Scanlon:
Let's go back to the building itself a bit. You've both referenced it as a piece of art, one of the few atmospheric theaters left, but there's parts of it that are off limits to the public that we don't see that also are very interesting pieces.
Jeff Fortier:
The secret movie room?
Larry Sells:
In the 40s, they built a screening room in there that seats 40 people because it was a different business then. You didn't get to stream or look at the movies that you wanted to buy, so all these little theater houses all over the Midwest, they would send people to Kansas City to the Uptown Theater to sit in that little room and look at the movies and see if they were going to rent that movie for their theater house, and so it was kind of neat.
Kelly Scanlon:
Tell us about some of the acts that you've had there.
Jeff Fortier:
Let's talk about the acts that we didn't get there. Let's talk about the fact that we had a date for Prince that it was on the calendar and we were trying to close it. He was going to play Kansas City and St. Louis. He passed before the show was able to be confirmed, and so that was a little painful. We lost Nine Inch Nails. We lost Nine Inch Nails because of COVID. It got booked. We were on the verge of going on sale and Nine Inch actually made a tour shirt for the tour that didn't happen, and I did not buy one. I couldn't bring myself to do it because I was like, oh, my. You work your career and there are just acts that you really feel are... If you could, and when you do this for 20, 25, 30 years, it really is fulfilling. And to see an artist like that you really, really appreciate and adore come and play the building that you're a part of.
Larry Sells:
Couple things were the ones that he did get. We got Bob Dylan twice, which were... And Dylan either is good or he is not so good, but he was great at the Uptown both times.
Kelly Scanlon:
An intimate setting probably helped, I would bet.
Jeff Fortier:
Right. And Muse and Black Crows. Dave Chappelle a couple times.
Larry Sells:
Ding, who plays auditoriums and comes in there because he wants to have a small deal, brings his son in and get to meet those people. I got to dance with Gwen Stefani. I think that's.
Kelly Scanlon:
I would've liked to have seen that.
Larry Sells:
That's still a highlight for her probably.
Jeff Fortier:
I still have PTSD over that one.
Larry Sells:
But it was great. Had Kris Kristofferson in there and talking about his deal in the wars.
Jeff Fortier:
Mearl Haggard, a lot of the old great ones.
Larry Sells:
And a lot of them talked about when they were there in the 70s and 80s at the Uptown and how much better it is. That makes you feel good and how much they enjoyed and how they come back. Lyle Lovett comes back just as Sleep at the Wheel guy said, because it's the Uptown and he's going to come to the Uptown and that's what he's going to do, and he is going to make sure he does it every year if he can.
Kelly Scanlon:
Tell us a little bit about Mammoth Productions, how you got it started and what you do besides the Uptown.
Jeff Fortier:
In 1989, I started booking shows in Lawrence at a place called The Outhouse. I just turned 19. I just got to the Army and we started to book all the punk rock shows and it just happened that we were... I'd grew up in the East Coast. I was going to New York to see shows. I grew up going to CBGB's and the Anthrax and a bunch of these New York venues, and I had some friendships that were built. Back then, when you booked a show you were loading in your van right next to the stage, so it's pretty easy to meet everyone. And everyone hung out outside and ate pizza and bought records, and it was different within that community. And I don't think that any of us ever anticipated that Nirvana, and Tool, and Green Day, and the Offspring would become huge stars. And so we just happened to be at the cusp where Green Day, who played the Outhouse and the Offspring and Tool and the Boss Tones, these are all acts that ended up becoming really, really, really famous and very successful.
The artist felt, and the people that managed them and booked them, felt that we were the right people to go on the journey with them. And so we booked them at the Outhouse, and then we booked them at Liberty Hall in Lawrence, and then we booked them at Memorial Hall, and then we worked our way to Municipal and then all of a sudden, within six years, we were doing small arena shows. And so that really wasn't the plan. I was apprenticing as a chef and I was in the Chef Apprentice Program at Johnson County Community College, and I thought I was going in a different direction. I chose to stay in Kansas City, or in Lawrence at the time, and this music thing was happening.
Mammoth was always a regional booking company. We were always booking Wichita, Omaha, St. Louis and Kansas City, or Lawrence because if we didn't, the shows would go from St. Louis to Minneapolis to Denver, or they'd go south. But there really wasn't some of the individuals within those markets booking the way that we were. I guess you can say we started to build a company from that point. I think it was hard for us to view it as a company because to us, we were living our dreams. And so when you're in that position, maybe you don't sweat the financials as much as you sweat the ability to continue to be able to do what you love to do. I think can speak for Larry, and I'm sure a lot of people that are listening to this podcast, it is a very great gift to be able to do what you love and be a part of something that you've helped create. And that is a gift that I think most, a lot of us feel every day, and so I try to keep that in mind as we move forward.
We are very blessed to have the success we have with Mammoth. Mammoth has gone from a regional promoter to a national promoter. We have a global partner now. We are doing major tours. We have a venue portfolio, and we are trying to maintain that local small town community feel that we grew up on. This is the secret of our success.
Kelly Scanlon:
And that community feel extends beyond the music community, the live event. You have a philanthropic division. Talk to us about that, where you're able to even extend your outreach even further.
Jeff Fortier:
That is really Casey. Casey Hunt really felt that we were missing a piece, especially... This is Josh's wife. She runs admin for the company. She's just such a giving person and she felt that we needed to give back and she felt strongly enough about it to tell us that that's what we were doing. And we of course agreed, and we started to build a relationship with Save the Elephants and water.org and then that grew to local and regional charities. We donate between 50 cents and a dollar of every ticket that we sell throughout all of our venues. A little bit humbling every once in a while when you're looking at what you're able to contribute and see how much it's affecting other people's lives.
Kelly Scanlon:
What's your vision for the Uptown 10, 15 years from now? How's it going to be relevant still?
Jeff Fortier:
It's a really simple answer, maintain what we have. I think a lot of times, people tend to overlook the best things they have in their life, and I think the simplicity of this answer is just we can just keep it in the condition that it's in and then pass it to the next steward. That's it. It's that simple.
Kelly Scanlon:
Thank you both for coming on today and for sharing not just the history of this nearly 100-year-old icon here in Kansas City, but your vision for it. And as you say, it's quite simple.
Jeff Fortier:
And don't forget, we got Ringo Star coming up. There are a ton, a ton of great shows with Los Lobos and Taj Mahal, the Fab Four, Craig Ferguson, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mars Volta, Grand Funk Railroad, Iration, Wheeler Walker, Tommy Emmanuel, Little River Band, Ari Shaffir, LSD Dream. There's shows for the kids, Miranda Sings. Ben Folds is coming back. Orville Pack. We're already sold out with Bad Omens, the Wallflowers. I mean, we've got a lot of great shows coming and we just hope that everyone gets a chance to come to at least one show, have a nice and great evening in Midtown. Come to a show, have a drink, enjoy some music and yeah, let us thank our partners at Country Club Bank for the support and for being part of the next step in the future of the Uptown.
Joe Close:
This is Joe Close, President of Country Club Bank. Thank you to Jeff Fortier and Larry Sells for being our guest on this episode of Banking on KC. Jeff and Larry aren't just investors in Kansas City's historic Uptown Theater, they see themselves as stewards. As Jeff said, "The thing about an old theater is it's like a painting. You have to treat it like a piece of art. You have to maintain it. Otherwise, it doesn't last." He extends that stewardship to the community surrounding the theater as well. Noting that the success of the Uptown has spurred the growth of the restaurants and businesses in the area, ultimately benefiting the surrounding neighborhood. As the Uptown's banking partner, we are proud to be a part of building the Future for the Uptown and the community it supports. Thanks for tuning in this week. We're banking on you, Kansas City. Country Club Bank, member FDIC.