After 16 years at the helm, Ray Solley, who has served as the executive director and public face of the Tower Theatre Foundation, the nonprofit that operates the historic, 460-seat theater in downtown Bend, announced his retirement Monday.

“The timing is a real opportunity for the company,” he told The Bulletin. “I’ve got the staff in place, we’ve got the finances in place, we’ve got the board in place. There’s a lot of growth we can do with education and community outreach.”

Solley’s last day will be July 1, and he will stay involved as a consultant to help with long-term planning.

Theater beginning

The Tower Theatre began its life as a movie theater in 1940 and after falling into disrepair, began a journey in the 1990s that included being purchased by the city of Bend. A community effort to save the Tower began in 1997. A group of residents formed a board in an ultimately successful effort to save the theater. The Tower Theatre Foundation was incorporated in 1997, and a capital campaign began in 1999. In 2001, the foundation purchased the Tower, and on Jan. 30, 2004, reopened it as a performing arts venue.

Since Solley came aboard in 2009, attendance increased 50% to 60,000 patrons a year, with the venue now actively used 220 days a year. Full-time staff has tripled to 15, memberships quadrupled to 1,314, and gifts, grants and memberships grew from $323,783 in 2009 to $824,516 in 2024. The Tower’s economic impact on Central Oregon was recently calculated to be $2.7 million by the Americans for the Arts economic prosperity calculator.

Journey to Bend

A 1974 graduate of Kentucky Wesleyan College, Solley began his career as an intern at a PBS affiliate in Chicago, working on a TV program starring Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel, initially called “Opening Soon at a Theater Near You.”

He worked as associate producer on Siskel and Ebert’s “Sneak Previews” in 1976. “It’s actually my hands buying the tickets, popcorn, candy, and soda in the show’s opening titles!,” Solley told The Bulletin in 2021, when Solley was being featured on a podcast “Gene and Roger,” along with other former staffers of the popular movie criticism program and it’s thumbs-up, thumbs-down reviews.

Solley became producer of the show in 1980 and produced the second iteration of the series with Neal Gable and Jeffrey Lyons through 1983.

He moved to Los Angeles and did work for “The Tonight Show” as a talent coordinator, then went on to a series of development and programming for Samuel Goldwyn Company and then Paramount Television. At Paramount, he worked on “Entertainment Tonight” and “Solid Gold.”

Solley next launched an independent consulting company, selling TV shows to cable operators, then went to do the same kind of work at the William Morris Agency.

That led up to Solley and his family moving to Bend in the late 2000s. His wife, Michelle Solley, is a philanthropy officer at St. Charles Foundation, and their son lives in Bend as well.

“It’s been great. I’ve never been in one job this long, and I’ve never been in one place this long,” Ray Solley said. “Which is great. We love it, and we’re going to stay here.”

In Solley’s retirement announcement on Monday, Dr. Gary Gallagher, chair of the Tower Theatre Foundation’s board of directors, said, “We are deeply grateful to Ray for his dedication and commitment to the arts and artists of Central Oregon. His vision and guidance for more than 16 years have made the Tower Theatre the iconic and beloved symbol of our community that it is today. We look forward to building upon the strong bedrock of his legacy.”

“The most rewarding thing was to see it go from a renovated piece of property to a community gathering place that is literally the center of the city and of Central Oregon and is an icon,” Solley said. “(It’s) the education that goes on in there, the entertainment, the friendships, the family traditions, people coming to the Tower Christmas year after year, going to see ‘The Nutcracker’ to see the grandkids. There’s a lot of community ownership is what you really want to see happen. You don’t want it to be a shrine to the people who renovated it. You want it to be a living room for the community.”

More Information

Information and application details for the Tower Theatre Foundation’s executive director position is posted at app.dover.com/jobs/towertheatrefoundation.