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Help Build AZAA’s New Home at Green Gables

Moving into 2026 with a piece of Phoenix History

After 20 years of breakthroughs, bravery, and community, Arizona Actors Academy is moving to a historic new home and we need your help to build the next stage (pun intended).

WHY WE’RE HERE.

For nearly twenty years, Arizona Actors Academy has been a home to artists, truth-tellers, risk-takers, and anyone brave enough to step into the light and say, “I want more.” This December, we received unexpected news: after five years at our McDowell studio, our new landlord’s demands priced us out. Our lease ends in February.

It was a moment of fear, quickly followed by, “Okay, figure it out.”

And we did. Because what our students, alumni, and teachers have built here is too meaningful, too necessary, and too alive to let a hedge fund decide its fate.

OUR NEW HOME IS…drum roll. THE GREEN GABLES CASTLE AT 24TH & THOMAS

Learn more about our new building’s awesome history.

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GREEN GABLES

The moment we pulled up to the historic Green Gables building, we knew. This wasn’t just a space.
It was a story; one we belonged in.

Built in the 1930s, The Green Gables Restaurant was once known as “Camelot in the Desert.” Guests arrived through flaming torches, greeted by knights in shining armor, trumpeters on balconies, and Robin Hood parking cars. For decades it was one of Phoenix’s most theatrical landmarks. A place where imagination met community.

It’s wild. It’s whimsical. It’s exactly what AZAA students deserve.

And now, it will be our new home.

🌟 WHY WE’RE FUNDRAISING

The move is urgent, and it’s big.

While we’ve worked hard to keep tuition accessible (we haven’t raised prices since before COVID), the reality is that moving a full acting studio; the stage, lighting, signage, build-out, safety improvements, storage, and the infamous futon, comes with significant costs.

Our goal is $20,000, which will allow us to:

💡 WHAT YOUR DONATION SUPPORTS:

  • Move & reinstall our exterior sign (crane, permits, electrician — the biggest expense)

  • Upgrade and install stage lighting

  • Paint & ready the new performance space

  • Build out necessary framing & secure bookshelves to meet safety codes

  • Purchase new seating (farewell, futon – we loved you, but… enough is enough)

  • Add needed storage & organizational systems

  • Rent trucks, buy moving supplies, cover labor costs

  • Restore our old space to recover the security deposit

These are the essentials that get us fully moved in by February and ready to welcome artists into a renewed, safe, inspired training home.

✨ WHY THIS MATTERS NOW:

We’re living through a challenging time; for artists, for young people, for performers, and for anyone searching for real human connection in an age of isolation and AI.

But on our stage, nothing is fake.
The work is live.
The risk is real.
The breakthroughs are personal.
The community is the heartbeat of everything we do.

AZAA has given countless artists a place to grow, heal, train, and transform. It has given many of us a purpose. And one day, younger hands will carry it forward.

This move ensures that purpose continues: boldly, creatively, and rooted in a space with a story as extraordinary as the people inside it.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

Whether you’re a current student, an alum, a parent, a friend of the arts, or someone whose life was shaped on our stage:

You can be part of building the next 20 years of AZAA.

Give if you can.
Share if you can.
Volunteer if you can.

It all matters.

  • $25: A Brushstroke of Support

  • $50: Light the New Stage

  • $100: Build the Foundation

  • $250: Move the Sign

  • $500: Patron of the New Studio

  • $1,000: Founding Builder Circle (name listed on a permanent display in the new space)

  • Donation of $350 allows us to retire the old futon with dignity and gratitude.
    We’ll send it off with a ceremonial bow and possibly a Viking funeral.
    (Jacque said no to actual fire. She is correct.)

💛 THANK YOU

Thank you for believing in this school.
Thank you for standing with artists.
Thank you for helping us enter 2026 renewed, galvanized, bold, and bloody excited.

Let’s build this together.
Let’s make the next era of AZAA unforgettable.

All donations are tax-deductible and restricted to capital and relocation expenses supporting a community arts training space operated by Arizona Actors Academy. 

Is my donation tax-deductible?

Yes. This fundraiser is fiscally sponsored by Theatre Upstairs, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit arts organization. Donations are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.

Why is a nonprofit sponsoring a for-profit school?

Theatre Upstairs is serving as a fiscal sponsor for this one-time capital campaign to preserve a community arts training and performance space. Funds are restricted to relocation and build-out costs only.

What will the funds be used for?

Donations support essential relocation expenses, including moving and reinstalling our exterior sign, stage lighting, safety improvements, build-out, seating, storage, and restoring our former space.

Will my donation support salaries or operating expenses?

No. All funds are restricted to one-time capital and relocation costs and do not support payroll or ongoing operating expenses.

What happens if you exceed the fundraising goal?

Any additional funds will be used to further improve safety, accessibility, and long-term sustainability of the new studio.

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Help Build AZAA’s New Home at Green Gables

Read on for -

GREEN GABLES DELIGHTFUL HISTORY!

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A true Camelot in the Desert

The story of our new home: Green Gables

When I learned the history of this building, I got chills.

Built in the 1930s, the original Green Gables Restaurant wasn’t just a place to eat, it was an experience, a destination, and a piece of living theater. Long before “immersive” became a buzzword, Green Gables invited people to step out of ordinary life and into story.

Camelot in the Desert - Phoenix Magazine - 2017

Guests arrived through stone walls lit by flaming torches. A knight in shining armor on horseback greeted them at the gate. Trumpeters announced arrivals. Robin Hood might park your car. Inside, Lady Guinevere escorted diners past armor, crossbows, and pikes into rooms designed to feel like medieval England. It earned its nickname honestly: “Camelot in the Desert.”

For decades, Green Gables was a cultural landmark in Phoenix. A place people chose for celebrations, milestones, and unforgettable nights. Hollywood figures like Henry Fonda, Bob Hope, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Mario Lanza, and Clark Gable passed through its doors. Waylon Jennings worked there as a young man, long before his music career. Even Arizona’s own Barry Goldwater was known to join the revelry. This wasn’t just dinner. It was pageantry, imagination, and shared experience.

What moves me most isn’t the celebrity, though. It’s the intention behind the place.

Green Gables was built to make people feel something. To cross a threshold and arrive more open, more playful, more alive to possibility. It asked its guests to participate, to suspend disbelief, to enter a shared world. That is exactly what we do at AZAA.

Actors know how much space matters. When you walk into a room designed for imagination, something in you shifts. You listen differently. You risk more. You show up with your whole self. Green Gables was built for that kind of arrival.

It feels less like nostalgia and more like continuation. A storied place, reclaimed for living artists. A space where the next generation of brave, loud, unapologetic creators can gather, train, and tell the truth together.

If you’d like to read more about the incredible history of Green Gables and its place in Phoenix culture, these two articles are wonderful and worth your time: Phoenix Magazine, “Camelot in the Desert” and The Society for Commercial Archeology, “Phoenix’s Mid-Century Medieval Dining Experience: Green Gables”