DELAND, Fla. — The Athens Theater in downtown Deland welcomed back theatergoers Wednesday night for the first time since March. 

During the five-month shutdown resulting from the coronavirus pandemic, theater staff have been hard at work enhancing safety measures to make it possible to safely play host to in-person performances again. They have installed air purifiers, hand-sanitizing stations, and dividers, and they put social-distancing measures in place.

Athens Theater leaders estimated that they have lost $425,000 during the closure, but staff are now more concerned about keeping guests healthy and apart from one another. 

“Although it maxes out our capacity at about 30 percent, it was much more important for us to create a safe environment than it was for us to try and pack as many people as we were allowed to pack in here,” Alexa Baldwin, the theater's director of marketing and operations, said.

Theatergoers will take in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged/Revised, a three-actor comedy that squeezes all 37 of Shakespeare's plays into 97 minutes. The actors have been socially distancing and rehearsing virtually for the past six weeks in order to keep each other healthy while on stage. 

“There are moments where we have to come into close physical contact with each other, but every time we go backstage, we are sanitizing, we are spraying,” actor Alan Ware said. “It's a Lysol show.” 

All employees and guests coming into the theater for performances will undergo health screenings to enhance safety even further. All touched surfaces will be sprayed down before and after every show, too.  

"That is the nature of theater,” Ware said. “We always adapt through every age and era.” 

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged/Revised runs through August 23. Tickets remain available.