After producing 10 seasons of adventuresome plays and musicals, AXIS Theatre of Maryland will close due to financial losses.

Artistic director Brian Klaas sent subscribers a letter last week announcing the closing of the 68-seat community theater in Meadow Mill in Hampden.

Klaas said he hopes to reorganize the theater's forces and begin producing plays again as early as next fall. He expects the new organization to have another name and "a somewhat different focus."

AXIS Theatre opened in January of 1993 with the production Tales of the Lost Formicans, a dark domestic comedy. This season's five show lineup was to include the off-Broadway hit Hedwig and the Angry Inch.