This week, the professional Centenary Stage Company says goodbye to its dog-eared, radiator-rattling Little Theatre in the Hackettstown college's iconic Seay Administration Building.

And finally, after the completion of the biggest capital campaign in the school's history, it's time to say hello to the David and Carol Lackland Center, a 68,000-square-foot multipurpose facility that will include two theater spaces — the 485-seat Sitnick Theater and the flexible Edith Bolte Kutz '42 Theater (a black-box space).

Flexing its new muscle, Centenary Stage Company has upped its public theater productions from three to five, including Neil Simon's popular and timely "The Prisoner of Second Avenue," which opens Friday in the Sitnick and continues through Oct. 17.

Artistic Director Carl Wallnau, also chairman of the college's Fine Arts department, is thrilled to see the results of the campaign, which began with a seven-figure donation from alumna Carol Lackland and her husband.

"We first heard rumors about 2003 and, by 2004, it seemed more tangible and we started having meetings," Wallnau said. "I'm very happy with the space.'

Of course, while he rehearses an all-professional cast for his season-opener, he's also had to adapt his department, his company and himself to new surroundings.

"It's bizarre in here, a slightly unreal quality," he said. "There's a difference between seeing it and using it. We've booked every kind of thing we can imagine here to see what we can learn about it. It seems like a very lively space."

Centenary College President Dr. Barbara Jayne Lewthwaite is even more excited about this significant addition to the college.

"I guess it was mid-July when we got the certificate of occupancy, and since then we've been like little kids in a candy store," she said. "The students were thrilled and we have seen an increase of students in our theater and communication programs."

Lewthwaite, who said she was not permitted to reveal the exact amount of Lackland's donation (earlier reports on Centenary's website put it at $8 million), added that the building is much more than a performing-arts center. In addition to a gallery space for visual artists, there is a new TV studio, a new home for the college's radio station (and NPR affiliate), WNTI, a new dining hall and cafe, classrooms, a dance studio and board rooms.

The campaign also covered other projects on the campus, according to Lewthwaite, including a complete renovation of the Faulkner Gym at the Reeves Center, plus a new wrestling room.

Wallnau, though, is immersed in the 22,000 new square feet of performance-art facilities.

"I had input to a degree about the space, but there were mandates beyond what I wanted," he said. "Five-hundred (seats) is too big for us, but we put 200 seats in the balcony," which he said he will likely not open for main-stage theater productions.

The black box will accommodate smaller, edgier productions Wallnau has wanted to do, but were thought to be too hard a sell to the public. At 50-by-80 feet, Wallnau says he can fit an audience of 80 to 115 people there.

But first, he's prepared a crowd-pleaser to hopefully fill the Sitnick. To that end, Wallnau postponed his traditional opener — a big-cast historical comedy (they will do "Oliver" for the holidays) — and went with one of Broadway's most popular playwrights.

"I've never really been a big Simon fan," Wallnau said. "Then I went to see 'Brighton Beach Memoirs' in New York and I was kind of blown away. Then I read 'Prisoner' and it seemed like it was pulled right from the newspaper. What happens when you spend 22 years with the same company and lose your job? And there's a crisis with health insurance, paying the rent and other family problems. There's also a reference to unemployment at 6.7 percent, which tells you something about our current state (when unemployment in the United States is around 9.6 percent)."

So Simon it is, with Wallnau directing a stellar cast that includes Allen Lewis Rickman, who has turned in some knockout performances here in between film work with the Coen Brothers ("A Serious Man") and TV work with Martin Scorsese (he plays Baxter on the new HBO series, "Boardwalk Empire"). Rickman will be joined by other familiar faces, including Liz Zazzi, Maria Brodeur and Jeffrey Barber.

"Actually, we've all been kidding Carl about doing a Neil Simon play because he's never wanted to," Lewthwaite said.

Tickets are $20 to $25, with discounts for seniors, students and groups. For more information, call 908-979-0900 or visit www.centenarystageco.com.