Around 11 a.m. on the 27th, inside the Woori Card Hall (grand theater) at NOL Theater Daehakro in Dongsung-dong, Jongno-gu, Seoul, the finishing work on the stage lighting for the musical Secretly, Greatly was in full swing. Stage engineers gathered in the center of the audience seats alternated their gaze between the computer screens and the stage as they searched for background music and suitable lighting for the musical.
Set to officially open on the 30th, the venue has three underground floors and five above ground, with a total floor area of 1,584 pyeong (about 5,236㎡), making it the largest in the Daehakro area. The 935-seat Woori Card Hall on the second and third basement levels is the only grand theater in Daehakro. The second and third floors above ground house the 490-seat medium theater Woori Investment & Securities Hall. Nol Universe Co leased the entire building, and its subsidiary NOL Theater took on commissioned operations.
NOL Theater Daehakro had long been considered Daehakro's "aching finger" because it could not operate normally for the past 10 years. Completed in 2013 under the name Daehakro Musical Center, the building was created as a large venue with more than 2,000 seats, including a grand theater (1,042 seats), a medium theater (528 seats), and a small theater (287 seats). At the time of completion, it drew attention as the sixth-largest venue in the country after LG Arts Center and Chungmu Art Center.
The venue opened in 2014 with the original musical The Days, but normal rentals and planning effectively halted as legal disputes, including a lien stemming from a construction cost dispute between the developer and the builder, flared up. In the end, the theater barely staged just two works in 2014, The Days and Ballet Player, before being left vacant and idle for a long period.
In 2021, moves to sort out rights through court mediation reignited talks on normalization, and in March last year Doohamji Development acquired the building. Nol Universe Co, which had long had its eye on the venue, secured more than 10 years of operating rights through a lease agreement and, after about a year of interior remodeling, is set to officially open on the 30th.
Baek Sae-mi, head of entertainment business at Nol Universe Co, said, "Daehakro is the heart of Korea's performing arts industry, but the infrastructure has centered on small theaters, and production, distribution, and marketing have been fragmented, which posed structural limits," adding, "We created NOL Theater Daehakro to solve these problems through a venue with a grand theater and to inject new vitality into Daehakro."
NOL Theater operates a total of five venues, including NOL Theater Daehakro, Blue Square, NOL Theater Hapjeong (formerly Shinhan Card SOL Pay Square), NOL Theater COEX (formerly COEX Artium), and Sohyang Theater (Busan). As of last year, these theaters had a cumulative audience of 1.56 million, a cumulative 153 productions, and 1,531 performances.
Nol Universe Co focused on maximizing the audience experience while remodeling NOL Theater Daehakro, which had been left idle for about 10 years. The 1,042-seat grand theater was reduced to 935 seats, and the 528-seat medium theater to 490 seats, to secure the best possible sightlines. The 287-seat small theater was removed and converted into a rehearsal room for actors.
Cha Su-jeong, venue business leader at Nol Universe Co, said, "Reducing the number of seats can hurt both producers and the venue, but we made a bold decision to raise the level of the audience experience," adding, "We incorporated feedback from audiences who visited 10 years ago and the know-how we have built while operating various theaters over the years into NOL Theater Daehakro."
Nol Universe Co plans to expand its audience base by linking venue operations with its own platform. It will use travel and leisure big data to plan performance packages combined with accommodations, and it aims to increase dwell time before and after shows by configuring the lobby, cafe, MD (merchandise), and photo zones to match each production's concept.
Baek said, "We find it meaningful to reopen NOL Theater Daehakro, a space that symbolized Daehakro's stagnation for the past decade," adding, "We hope this venue becomes a new symbol of Daehakro's performance culture and a space that symbolizes the coexistence of the platform and performing artists."