Portal:Houston/Music, Arts & Culture/December 2007

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The Wortham Theater Center is a performing arts center in Houston, Texas, United States. The Center was designed by Eugene Aubrey of Morris Architects and built entirely with $66 million in private funds. It officially opened on May 9, 1987 with one of the inaugural performances being a modern dance program, Tango Argentino, in the Brown Theater and Robert Wilson and David Byrne's The Knee Plays , presented by the Society for the Performing Arts in the Cullen Theater. A significant portion of the funding needed to build the center came from estate of the late Gus S. Wortham (1891-1976), a local philanthropist and founder of American General Insurance Company. The Wortham Foundation contributed $20 million for the construction of the new Theater Center, which was named for him.