By LEAH WEATHERSBY

A torch was passed at the Empty Space Theatre last month when Allison Narver succeeded longtime artistic director Eddie Levi Lee, who is stepping down after an eight-year stint.

At 60, Lee plans to spend his time writing and some occasional acting when he needs to, ³to put food on the table.² In fact, Lee appeared in Taproot Theatreıs production of ³You Canıt Take It With You² last month.

Lee has relinquished his artistic director position at the Empty Space, but Narver will not be at the theater full time until April as she is currently directing a regional theater production on the East Coast.

Although she is a Seattle native, perhaps best known as the former artistic director of downtown Seattleıs Annex Theatre, Narver has spent the last few years back east. She earned a masters degree in theater directing from Yale University and until recently has been the resident director of ³The Lion King² on Broadway.

Looking back on the past decade, Lee says he fell in love with Seattle and its appreciative theater audiences on a trip to the city and he and his wife Joy decided to move here in 1991. At the time, he had no prospects, but a year and a half later in 1993 he was given the job of artistic director at the Empty Space.

No doubt Leeıs impressive list of regional theatre credits helped pave the way for him. Originally from Atlanta, Lee founded his own theater there called the Southern Theater Conspiracy in 1979. Lee co-wrote plays for the Southern Theater including ³Some Things You Need to Know Before the World Ends: A Final Evening with the Illuminati² (which was performed at the Empty Space in 1993) and ³Tent Meeting,² which enjoyed quite a tour on the regional theatre circuit with stops at such noted venues as the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., before finally dying at the hands of unsympathetic critics in New York.

While Lee says he wishes ³Tent Meeting² had been an off-Broadway hit, heıs also glad he wasnıt stuck in New York City.

New Yorkıs loss seems to have been the Empty Spaceıs gain. Lee arrived just at the time the Empty Space was moving from its previous home in Pioneer Square to its current building (previously a production space with no in-house theatre company) in the heart of downtown Fremont.

Though he didnıt take part in the decision to move the theater, Lee says Fremont makes an ideal home, partly because of the many ³nonconformists and ex-hippies² that still populate the neighborhood.

Lee believes he has continued the mission of Empty Spaceıs previous two artistic directors: to present work that is especially suited to the medium of theater and that has both a strong intellectual and emotional component.

Lee stresses the advantage of new blood coming into the Empty Spaceıs administration. He describes his decision to leave by telling the story of a day when he walked out to the rather busy and complex intersection in front of the Empty Space and realized he knew the exact sequence and timing of all the intersectionıs many traffic signals. He figured that it might be time for a change of scene.

³I thought ŒI gotta go.ı² Lee said.

As for Naver, she says sheıs looking forward to returning to the Northwest with her husband and new daughter, Kate, and working with the local theater community and playwrights. ³This was a great opportunity for me to live in Seattle again,² Narver said.

Lee says he doesnıt expect Naver to change the Empty Spaceıs core values too much. He points out that the Annex Theatre produced both ³Tent Meeting² and ³Illuminati² in the early 1990s. Lee also noted that while the Empty Space did conduct a nationwide search for their new artistic director, Narver was the first person he thought of to fill the spot.

³Her credentials are incredible,² said Lee of Narver. ³I bet Iıll agree with every play that Allison picks for next year.²