Cultural growth in Las Vegas is all about baby steps. Take theater, for example. Though the landscape is steadily changing thanks to a stable-but-small community-theater base, we’re still far from rivaling the Great White Way for professional productions that haven’t been Vegas-ized for the casino consumer. But one of those baby steps is quietly under way in perhaps the unlikeliest of places.

Located inside converted movie theaters at Neonopolis, the Las Vegas Playhouse is nearing completion. Crews are working on costumes and props for a mid-December opening of The Night Before Christmas, Theatre Las Vegas’ premiere production at the Playhouse. The first show will utilize a new 70-seat black-box theater, formerly Galaxy Theater No. 14. The Playhouse’s dressing room and costume/scene/prop shop is located in Theater 13, while Theater 12 has already undergone a dramatic transformation from cinema to main stage.

An impressive proscenium arch has already been constructed, and the main-stage space is scheduled to be finished in March 2009, with seating for approximately 200. Plans call for the never-before-used Neonopolis rotunda to eventually become the lobby, thus establishing the Playhouse as a completely separate entity from the cinemas. Patrons can park on the fourth floor of the Fremont Street garage and take the bridge directly to the Playhouse entrance.

Unlike the volunteer-reliant community theaters in town, Theatre Las Vegas is creating a professional company at the Playhouse, with paid actors, crew and staff, in an attempt to create a higher caliber of theater. “We’ll start out with guest contracts, then we’ll go up to full board,” Artistic Director Dan Decker explains, citing a combination of ticket sales, donations, grants and corporate gifts that will go toward that pro-theater-company goal.

In addition, Decker hopes to establish an internship program and work with the Art Institute and nearby Las Vegas Academy of International Studies, Performing and Visual Arts. The Playhouse also intends to offer its own classes in writing, acting and directing.

“Having a theater like this that is so flexible and so accessible and right in the center of town is just fantastic,” Decker says, adding that a nominating committee will eventually invite successful community-theater productions to perform at the Playhouse.

With a productions wish-list ranging from children’s theater to dramas, musicals, comedies and edgy late-night shows, Decker doesn’t plan to roll out an entire season of shows right away. Instead, he’d like to begin with one-off productions to gauge the types of productions that best draw locals and tourists.

“We need to know what our demographic is, who’s going to come to the theater,” he says. “Is it the same crowd that goes to Spring Mountain or The Onyx or [Las Vegas] Little Theatre? Or is it a whole different crowd altogether that comes Downtown?”