Daniel MacIvor's award-winning play, Never Swim Alone, the season opener at the recently renovated St. Marks Theatre in New York City, will also herald a promising new management structure at the theatre, which had been plagued by on-again, off-again efforts to make a go of the venue.

Beginning with Never's six-week run on Oct. 1., the Horse Trade Theater Group, the management company that has been booking and producing theater at The Kraine and Red Room in the KGB Complex, will assume management of the St. Mark1s Theater (formerly St. Marks Studio Theater.)

St. Mark's has been renovated with a new lighting grid, dimmer board, and lighting instruments. In addition, a sound system has gone in, which features CD, cassette player and speakers. The theatre's new seating plan allows 64 patrons to sit on both sides of the stage area. Never earned the Overall Excellence -- Drama/Comedy award at the 1999 New York International Fringe Festival. The play is being presented by Brooklyn1s Go Productions and is directed by Timothy P. Jones.

Never Swim Alone was described by a production spokesperson as an absurd, hilarious, yet haunting play about male relationships. A sequence of scenarios is played out between two lifelong male friends and refereed by a young woman who holds the key to a dark secret of their past.

Considered one of Canada1s best known playwrights, MacIvor's newest play, Monster, recently premiered at P.S. 122. Other works by MacIvor include Somewhere I Have Never Traveled, Yes I Am and Who Are You, House and Here Lies Henry. Never runs Oct. 1- Nov. 6. Tickets are $12. St. Mark1s Theater is located at 94 St. Mark1s Place (between First Avenue and Avenue A). For information and reservations call (212) 777-6088.

-- By Murdoch McBride