Review by David Gregson [SanDiego.com, 15 October 2005]

Few press fanfares have played longer and louder than those celebrating the establishment of the Stephen & Mary Birch North Park Theatre on the San Diego cultural map. The hoopla – and the gradual transmogrification of a nearly forgotten 1928 movie and vaudeville house into a little jewel of a performing arts center-- has been going on for five and a half years now. The prime mover of this project, in concert with the City of San Diego and developer Bud Fischer, has been Lyric Opera San Diego, always destined to make the theatre its home. With Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Mikado, last night’s inaugural production in Lyric Opera’s new house, the San Diego arts scene enters a new era. It was a modest show, hardly an atom blast of an opener, but a rich fallout of blessings is certain to affect all those who love theater, dance and music.