When things shut down in March, Mercury Theater proprietor L. Walter Stearns — one of the few commercial theater producers in the city to own the real estate they operate on — thought he’d be out of business for a month or so. Now he says he can’t see any near-term end to the danger COVID poses to performers, staff and patrons — so the only way he can avoid foreclosure on the mortgage is to shutter the company and sell the buildings. – Chicago Tribune