One of the ideas driving the renovation of the Roxian Theater is the impact it could have on the neighborhood, creating a draw for a young, hip crowd interested in clubs and restaurants and coffee shops.

It's a vision espoused by Andrew Hieber, who is in line to operate the Roxian when it opens. And he's put his money where his mouth is, opening a coffee shop in a former nuisance bar in the heart of downtown McKees Rocks.

Revolutionaries Cafe, on Thompson Avenue just off Chartiers Avenue, has a coffee bar, a few booths and tables and a small stage. It sells sandwiches and soft drinks as well as the full gamut of coffee products, and is clearly aimed at a hipster clientele with inscrutable artwork painted on the walls and a bookshelf filled with literary odds and ends.

"We even have the requisite Buddha," Mr. Hieber said, pointing at a small metal figure. "But its head comes off," he said, demonstrating the veracity of his words.

That's typical of the irreverent air Mr. Hieber is aiming for, sort of a coffee shop poking fun at the coffee shop culture.

"I go into coffee shops everywhere, and the overwhelming feeling I get is one of arrogance," he said. He's after something a little funnier, a little funkier. To prove his point, he pulled an autobiography of Ronald Reagan off the bookshelf. "What other coffee shop is going to have that?" he asked.

Even the name is a poke at the stereotype of the "coffeehouse revolutionary," the kind that talks a great deal about change but does little.

But there's another meaning to the name. Mr. Hieber, a 39-year-old McKees Rocks native, hopes that the coffee shop and the theater are indeed part of a revolution, one that revitalizes the town.

He said it's no accident that the others involved in the project are also Rocks natives of his generation.

"When we were kids in the early '80s, the streets were safe, there were lots of shops, and there were all kinds of different people here. The nationality festivals were great; it was like having the whole United States in one neighborhood."

But the town crashed in the '80s like so many others, and is now littered with empty houses and storefronts and mired in poverty. Mr. Hieber thinks it's time for his generation to step up.

"We still have the guts to try something original, but are old enough to have the resources," he said. "If I was 10 years younger, I wouldn't have the resources. If I was 10 years older, I wouldn't have the guts. ...

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