Despite the economy, it's on with the show

Economic problems have left every local performing arts group bloody but unbowed. Some changed their programming; others cut salaries; others reduced staff. Yet all are marching bravely into the 2009-10 season – and there's some good news among the bad.

N.C. Dance Theatre, which will celebrate its 40th anniversary in 2010, will move into the 1,100-seat Knight Theater next spring. NCDT anchors its season with a “Nutcracker” before Christmas but offers a range of footwork from contemporary (Alonzo King, Dwight Rhoden) to classic. Directors Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux and Patricia McBride danced for George Balanchine, and the company is linked to his masterpieces.

The Charlotte Symphony Orchestra will stay in Belk Theater, but under the auspices of a new music director – British maestro Christopher Warren-Green – after June. Christof Perick will be at the helm through the current season; he'll lead four concerts and devote two to Beethoven, wrapping up his tenure with the Ninth Symphony in April. That concert will feature the Oratorio Singers of Charlotte, who'll star earlier in the season in Bach's B Minor Mass.

Opera Carolina has been hardest hit among the heavyweights. It cancelled “Transit of Venus,” which would have closed its season at the Belk, and postponed the season-opening “Otello” until May. Still on the mainstage slate are “La Boheme” in January and a starry “Carmen” in March, with Denyce Graves singing the title role. The company will do its annual “Love Notes” concert shortly after Valentine's Day.

The local theatrical world doesn't have an equivalent to this trio; there's no professional Equity company for adults, now that Charlotte Repertory Theatre is gone. Nonetheless, theater unfurls in Charlotte in multiple ways.

Blumenthal Performing Arts Center brings a Broadway Lights season to the Belk; the likes of “Wicked,” “Mary Poppins” and “Spring Awakening” are on the way amid national tours. The PAC packs its smaller houses – the Knight, Booth Playhouse, Duke Energy Theater and cabaret-style Stage Door Theater – with long runs (“Shear Madness”), comedians and one-person shows.

Children's Theatre of Charlotte does a vast range of programming, from its splashy opener (Disney's musical version of “Beauty and the Beast”) to productions for pre-schoolers (“If You Take a Mouse to the Movies”). Young people often appear onstage, and the high school troupe has earned respect.

Actor's Theatre of Charlotte fills an off-Broadway-type niche, producing provocative works by contemporary playwrights; it opens with “Big Boys,” Rich Orloff's comedy about greed and lack of ethics in corporate America.

Theatre Charlotte, which uses talented non-professionals, enters its 82nd season as the state's oldest continually producing theater. It focuses on musicals (“Seussical”) and American classics (“A Streetcar Named Desire”).

Our theatrical fringe has shrunk over the years. A few troupes still mount full-length seasons – notably Queen City Theatre Company, which specializes in plays about society's outsiders, and Carolina Actors Studio Theatre, which redesigns its Clement Avenue space for every piece – while others do two or three outings a year. It's easiest to track them all through the umbrella group Metrolina Theatre Association; its production matrix can be searched chronologically, by category or by company at www.metrolinatheatre.org.

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