ST. LOUIS • And now, the show can go on.

Financing for the long-awaited renovation of Kiel Opera House closed late Tuesday, after a battery of attorneys and money men signed off on a $78.7 million package of bonds and tax credits, loans and cash. By Wednesday morning, a crew of orange-shirted workers was erecting construction fencing around the Art Deco palace next to Scottrade Center.

It's the culmination of a year spent securing money for the project in a tough credit market, and of two decades of stop-and-start efforts to reopen the landmark auditorium, which hosted its last concert — by the St. Louis Philharmonic — in May 1991.

And while the team behind the rehab — David Checketts-led SCP Worldwide and developers Chris and Joe McKee — declined to comment publicly Wednesday, others close to the deal said it's a great relief to be moving forward at last.

"Everyone's eager to get going," said Barbara Geisman, St. Louis' deputy mayor for development. "The many, many people who participated in this deal, and in getting it to closing, we're all thrilled to see it complete."

Cleanup work inside the building — removing asbestos and lead paint — is expected to start this week, and the 14-month construction timetable would set Kiel to reopen in the fall of 2011.

For most theatergoers, that prospect suggests shows, concerts and comedy acts in the 3,600-seat main hall, with its sweep of marble and velvet chic. SCP projects it will host 135 main theater events in its first year, up to 190 a decade later.

But Kiel also could provide a venue for small- and midsize local theater companies. It has four smaller side theaters, rooms with small stages that could host a meeting, wedding or fundraiser. Or a play.

That piques the curiosity of Scott Miller. As artistic director of the peripatetic New Line Theatre, Miller must regularly adjust to a new home. His troupe is getting ready to open "Evita" next week in the South Campus Theatre at Washington University but expects to be "homeless" again by late next year, when plans for that building change. Will Kiel fit New Line's bill?

"I don't think we can tell yet," Miller said. "They say they will create usable side spaces, but what kind of spaces will they be? What will they cost?"

That's what Charlie Robin is wondering, too. Executive director of the Edison Theater at Washington University, Robin likes Kiel's potential to 'shake things up," he said.

"But it's going to be a matter of how much the owners want to support the greater arts community," he said.

If SCP takes "a real corporate, bottom-line approach," with high rent and low flexibility, he said, creative but chronically underfunded arts organizations won't use those side theaters, and the building could struggle. But if they partner with groups that need the space, Robin said, good things will result.

It's also unclear how Kiel will affect other theaters in St. Louis. Fox Associates, which owns the Fox Theatre in Grand Center, has been vocal in its criticism of public financing for Kiel. It predicts that ticket prices will climb if venues are forced to compete for shows, and it says pouring $28 million of taxpayer money into the project tilts the field too far in Checketts' favor.

"It's a horrible waste of public money," said Richard Baker, Fox's president. "At a time when the city is cutting back or charging for services, I don't see how they can justify spending money on a venue that isn't needed."

But Kiel is needed, Geisman said, both as a venue for shows and for its role in revitalizing downtown.

"It'll be a great asset," she said.

Right now, the building is more like an eyesore. Weeds are popping up in the cracks of its stone front plaza. The Greek drama masks above each of its boarded front doors are worn with age. The sidewalk along 14th Street smells of dried urine and stale beer, and there are blankets left behind by people who sometimes sleep in the entryway to the grand old hall.

That will start changing soon.

Work was beginning Wednesday. The main contractor, Paric Corp., is moving in. And a public announcement, with full details, is being set for the next date that all of the deal's many principals are in town: July 12.

It is a day Ed Golterman has been looking forward to for a long time. Saving Kiel has been a life's work for the local activist, and watching this deal come together, he said, even from afar, has been a thrill. Now he is looking forward to watching his beloved building come back to life.

"I think they're going to do it right," he said.