LaShawn Pettus-Brown is the new owner of the Empire Theater on Vine Street in Over-the-Rhine. At the moment the theater is a gutted shell stripped of its facade and ornaments, but by the end of this year Pettus-Brown will be showing it off and making final plans for the grand opening in February 2003. Pettus-Brown never saw the old theater interior. He's 26, too young to have seen a building that closed in 1971. But he knows the entertainment business and he knows the neighborhood and he is promising us one of the most exciting new entertainment venues in all of Cincinnati, not just OTR.

Right now Pettus-Brown is back in Tokyo getting ready to play for Toyota in the fall schedule of corporate league basketball games. For the next few months he will commute between Tokyo and Cincinnati keeping his eye on his project and lining up acts for the Empire's stage. Pettus-Brown should also be remembered as the impresario of the first International Soul Festival at the USBank Arena last July. Before leaving for Japan he gave a personal account of the Empire purchase, the renovation plans and his hopes for the future of Cincinnati.

Artwhirled@iRhine:
How did the Empire Theater project get started?

Last November, just after Thanksgiving, Danielle Stenson, chief administrator of my company [Pettus-Brown Incorporated] called me in Japan and she said, "Shawn there's some building for sale called the Empire Theater on Vine Street," and I said, Yea, I know it, used to live right behind it. So she said, "Look on this website." So I'm on my computer in Tokyo and it's 4am and I look it up and I say, all right, BUY IT. And I talked to a real estate agent and cleared up some questions and told her, I'll buy it. She said, "You might want to look at it first." But I say I already know the building, I've thrown rocks at the building many a times. So at the price they wanted, I don't care about the inside of the theater. I had her send me a contract and I bought it.

So my goal is, I'm thinking I'd secure it, take my time with it. But when I got back to Cincinnati and I seen it and I seen what was going on in the revival of the city I said, we got to make this thing happen now. And two days later, the Mayor announced the Vine Street project. And say, Hey! All right, I'm on Vine Street. Cool. And I didn't know anything about the development funding.

A week later I got a phone call from the Mayor and Jim Franklin and they say, "What you got going on?" And I tell them and I say I need some money and they say, "Well, we're gonna help you." And now it's OPM, other peoples' money. I said I need a million dollars, but now we got it worked down to under $900,000. So they came up and met with me and I told 'em what I was doing. And then because it's politics and city money some folks said, "Ohhhh, he's gonna turn it into a night club!" And I said, I'm not going to do a nightclub, 'cause nightclubs just die out very fast and cause trouble. I'm an entertainer. So four weeks after they approved the money and we got started we were done with the demo and now we are making progress so the building will be ready by the end of the year and we open next February.

What was the neighborhood reaction?

With the Empire Theater at first people were saying, "Oh my god, are you sure, what about the area!" Well, I grew up in that area. I grew up in Laurel Homes, Lincoln Courts, and the West End and I lived on Republic for about two years. And that is my area. The people out on the streets, half of them I know, even the drug dealers, they were at school with me at Taft. So it's not like I am in danger. They know it's Shawn's place and they respect my place. They come by: they talk to me. So if they see somebody putting flyers they'll stop them or they'll tear them down. So when I get opened up I'll make sure they get in with a discount.

What I think is that it's more about "What are you doing" than "What are you saying." Concerning Over-the-Rhine I say look, you all talk about it, this is what I am doing. I know what I can do to help the city, it may not be much to some people, and some people may say I'm greedy 'cause I'm in it to make money. NO. I'm not putting a million dollars into one building in Vine Street. There's other ways to make money than to throw it at the hardest building on Vine Street to fix it up! But something had to be done and I didn't say I wanted to be the one. I just said I'm going to do it.

I didn't think the project would get this big when I first bought the building. But when it got big, I was like, well, this is great. When the Mayor said I want Shawn to get whatever he needs to get that going, it helps knock down all the walls. It was a blessing. And I've got my friend Rashad Young, [a former classmate, Assistant City Manager] someone I can call and talk to and he knows me. It looks like, luck, but it's not. I've been blessed and now everything set itself up so that I can get something done a lot faster and at the same time I am the one going in and breaking these walls down for other developers. The next person who comes in is going to get his things done a lot faster.

How's the construction going?

When I first came back and bought the building I said I'm gonna be open by September, but the architect said no, you gotta wait four months. I said this when we hadn't touched the building yet. So I found out the city has a new code and when we went and dropped off our plans we found out that we knew the code better than they did. We were preparing for the code. They had just got the code and said to us, "you all probably know more about this than we do." So we were walking them through the code while they were picking up on it at the same time. We're knocking down the walls that people say are there. And it's not a problem. I don't blame the city. I don't blame the people. I just say, "Look, we got a problem? Let's fix it and move on." Now we know what we need to work on. Let's make it happen. And Rashad Young and Valerie Lemmie [City Manager] are comin' in and askin' "what's the problem." 'Cause Rashad had told me, "call me if you need help," and if someone says that they should know I'm gonna call!

What kinds of music do you like and what kinds of acts should we expect to see when you open?

Everything. I love it all! Any type of music: heavy metal, classical, jazz, country, merengue: because my mind is just so open now. We are going to accommodate anybody and everybody's taste at one time point in time throughout the year.

Music is about your soul. If you have a happy soul you welcome any and all music. In Japan I'm listening to Japanese songs and I don't know what they is talking about, but you just feel it, it's about soul. I went to Kabuki theater all the time and every festival in Japan. That's why I started the International Soul Festival. I started that because I wanted to make sure that these people in Japan see not just the artists that made soul music but that music is about your soul. You know it's not just an African-American thing, it's not just and R and B, hip-hop thing. All music is intertwined somehow and if your soul is flowing free you are accepting everything.

Can other promoters rent the theater?

Yes, if some sub-promoter comes in and says, hey, I want to use your venue, you can hire it from us and we just have to make sure that the show you are doing is not one that damages the image of the venue. As long as it's not and it's entertaining, it's fun, we see it, we like it, we're not going to just rent the venue out, we're gonna help you promote it. Cause it's our place and it's our business.

I love business districts. You know Japan. In Tokyo, I'm out there 24/7. I just love business. Whenever I have a day off [from basketball], I love to see business just happening. Akasaka, Shinjuku, Shinegawa, I love it. As long as somebody's getting something done. It don't have to be me that day. I can take a day off and just go see it. We'll that's where the action it. The business district is what makes a city, you know, all these other cities we are talking about. And people are talking about our boycott. The central business district is the heart and pulse of your city. If it dies the rest of your city will die. So that's why I came back and said I'm gonna do the Soul Festival last July. And I was fighting the boycotters and they're saying I'm a sellout and this that and the other. And I said look, tell me what you want, but I'm a businessman. I know my people have stayed away from this area long enough, last year I'd never have done it. But this year I figured it was time to move on.

I never would say I am against the boycott. I'm against some of the things they are doing and how they are handling the boycott. Yes we have problems and they make some very valid points, but at the same time, the major companies downtown don't care about what the boycotters are saying because they are about business. So boycotters say, "Well, we'll just sit here and boycott Cincinnati and that'll hurt 'em." It's not going to hurt them. I own a company and I know what a company manager is going to do, he's gonna cut jobs and the jobs that are cut are the ones for the peers of the people who are boycotting. That's not the way to do it. The way is we keep on talking to them and working with them. Like, right now I'm getting set up for the Soul Festival for next year and I'm doing it on a three day weekend, as opposed to one day like we did the first time.