Orpheum Theatre, planned Holocaust museum trying to work out way to let theatre continue to use the alley that is its main entrance

Earlier this month, the operator of the Orpheum Theatre, which opened in 1852, sued the foundation now building a Holocaust museum at the corner of Tremont Street and Hamilton Place - the alley that leads to the Orpheum's main entrance - for the right to continue blocking the ally on performance nights for use by entertainers' equipment trucks and patrons waiting to go inside.

However, both Orpheum operator Crossroads Presents and the Holocaust Legacy Foundation yesterday asked a Massachusetts Land Court judge to postpone a hearing on the case scheduled for today because "the parties are currently discussing a possible resolution of this dispute." Judge Kevin Smith agreed and rescheduled the hearing until next Wednesday.

In its suit, Crossroads Presents, which runs 40 to 50 performances a year at the historic theater, said it would be forced out of business if the foundation insisted on preventing it from taking over the alley, which is basically its main entrance. Today's hearing would have been on its request for a preliminary injunction to order the foundation to remove the construction equipment now being stored in the alley.

Crossroads acknowledges it never got a formal, written agreement from either the foundation or the company the foundation bought the site from in 2022 to basically take over the alley on performance nights. But Crossroads says it's been doing that for more than 30 years, long enough to establish a legal right to keep on doing that, and that a 2018 Massachusetts Appeals Court decision noted that the company that sold the museum building to the company that sold it to the foundation did give the theater permission to use the alley to park "tour buses, vans and trucks" on its side of the alley, between 1979 and 2007.

In its suit, Crossroads says:

If the Foundation impedes the ability of the Orpheum Theatre to use Hamilton Place on Event Days, by leaving equipment on Hamilton Place or otherwise, in accordance with its apparent claim that the Orpheum Theatre and its invitees have no right to utilize the Western Portion of Hamilton Place, the Orpheum Theatre will go out of business. The Orpheum Theatre can't operate without performers, their equipment and patrons traveling over the Western Portion of Hamilton Place as they have for many decades.

The theater operator says that since 1994, on days of performances it has been blocking off Hamilton Place so that large trucks can load and unload equipment, which includes the part of the alley right in front of the museum, and that since 1999, it has specifically used barricades and security personnel to ensure the only vehicles entering the space are either servicing the theater or heading out of a Suffolk University garage - and that when the garage closes for the day, the barricades are move almost right up to Tremont Street.

The foundation, whose lawyers include former City Councilor Mike Ross - the son of a Holocaust survivor - has yet to file a written response to the suit.

Complete Orpheum complaint (1.6M PDF).