The renovations and upgrades are still ongoing at the Lyric Theatre, and with a recent donation, they will be able to do more.

On February 4 S3 Enterprises Inc. donated $50,000 to the not-for-profit organization with the sole purpose of upgrading the stage, lighting, and sound.

Gordon McCall, the artistic director at the Lyric Theatre, said there were talks between the two businesses before the donation was made and Golden West Radio's Mark Soper played a crucial role.

"It's an absolutely wonderful donation, we couldn't be happier," he said. "We thanked them so much and it's just a tremendous community that we have here and to see a business step up like this, we are just so proud to be a part of Swift Current."

Soper has been helping McCall with the Sparks in the Dark Play series and he also knows the owner of S3 Enterprises.

"We've become very close colleagues and friends and we've talked about needs in the theatre and he took that forward and has strong connections to the S3 Enterprises, Mr. Sonntag," he said. "And then I submitted information, as you can imagine anybody thinking of donating would like to know, everything from year-end annual reports, to mission statements, and vision and we did all of that. He contemplated over a period of time and he stepped forward and said he'd like to do it, so we were thrilled."

According to McCall, the Lyric will recognize S3 Enterprises inside the building and the funding will cover an addition to the stage, improved lighting, and improved sound.

"This will be a very vital step forward," he said. "Will it bring us to the ultimate end goal? Umm no, but the end goal can wait some too. This is going to be critical steps forward in terms of equipment and some extension on the stage."

There isn't an exact timeline set for when the upgrades to the stage, lights, and sound equipment will be done but McCall is hoping by the fall all of it is done.

"You'll see a little bit more variety possibilities in the lighting, you won't see anything, isn't that funny to say when you're talking about lighting," he said. "You'll notice it on the stage more than anything else. With the stage one of the things we're looking at doing is adding six feet to the back of the stage to give us more depth, so you would notice that... And in terms of sound, hopefully you're going to notice some overall improvement in the quality of the sound. I say hopefully because things are quite expensive as you know, so we're going to add on or replace to make sure that we don't lose in terms of obsolescence."