Southern California is famous for being ahead of the national curve -- in styles, fads and unenviable crises. And right now, the region's largest institutional theaters are serving as a crystal ball for leadership concerns affecting nonprofit theaters throughout the country.
I'm referring, of course, to Center Theatre Group, the Geffen Playhouse, South Coast Repertory, La Jolla Playhouse and the Old Globe, all of which are at crucial crossroads. The founders or guiding spirits of these prestigious theaters have left, are on the verge of leaving or are in a quandary about whether to make an exit at such a precarious historical moment. Meanwhile, their successors, caught between an economic rock and a cultural hard place, seem increasingly ready to give away the store to lure former subscribers from their Netflix queues.
This transitional anxiety, dating to Center Theatre Group founder Gordon Davidson's passing of the torch to Michael Ritchie in 2005, has only magnified worrisome developments that have intensified since the recession. Perhaps the most insidious among them is the blurring of commercial and nonprofit values.
Some explanatory back story: The regional (sometimes known as resident) theater movement, which resulted in the proliferation of nonprofit stages from coast to coast, was designed not simply to decentralize theater -- road shows had long been bringing live performance to the provinces -- but to allow it to flourish as an art form throughout the country.
Southern California's big theaters need fresh, dramatic thinking
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
Leadership changeovers have come at a dicey time. Best, then, to be bold.
As "The Cambridge Guide to Theatre" entry on the "Resident non-profit professional theatre in the USA" puts it: "Its non-profit status is significant in that box office profit is not of prime concern; rather the focus is on the art of the theatre, the development of theatre artists, craftsmen and administrators dedicated to establishing a new American theatre, and the production of classical and innovative contemporary drama."
There's plenty of latitude in this description, but it's hard to conceive that foundation money and tax exemptions were originally granted to pay for the current orgy of mass-musical frivolity and star-struck casting in plays that seldom spring from the next generation of playwrights.
The state of the art
Let's begin by acknowledging that in the last few seasons Southern California's nonprofit theaters haven't been firing on all cylinders. If they were elderly patients, their boomer children might be forgiven for wondering every now and again about nursing homes. In Pasadena Playhouse's extreme case, the financial blood work was so dire that cryogenics has been deemed the only hope.
Although these artistic directors would no doubt appreciate it if I borrowed a candy striper's uniform or better yet, a pair of pompoms at such an economically precarious time, I think the gadfly suit from the back of my critic's wardrobe is called for. It's already late March and only two shows have opened at Center Theatre Group's three theaters in 2010 -- "The Subject Was Roses" at the Mark Taper Forum and "Dreamgirls" at the Ahmanson. "The Wake" officially opens Sunday at the Kirk Douglas Theatre, and I'm thrilled by the prospect of Lisa Kron's new play -- but the title aptly describes the offerings thus far.
Nearly everywhere, budgets have been downsized, staff have been culled, and risk-taking, generally speaking, has ground to a halt. The gaps in CTG's programming have become so pronounced through postponed, shuffled and nixed productions that an outsider hearing the season lineup might reasonably assume that the organization was operating only a single venue.
San Diego's Old Globe -- headed by Lou Spisto, who has no compunction in assuming the corporate title of CEO/executive producer -- chose "Lost in Yonkers" for the inaugural production of its new 250-seat, in-the-round Sheryl and Harvey White Theatre (a luxurious reiteration of the Cassius Carter Centre Stage).
Even at theaters that have never lost sight of their mission, struggle is detectable. At South Coast Rep, still a wellspring of new American plays, revivals are cropping up whose chief lure is their familiarity. This season kicked off rather unambitiously with the old Stephen Sondheim compilation "Putting It Together." A not particularly fresh take on August Wilson's frequently mounted "Fences" followed in January. Beth Henley's war horse "Crimes of the Heart," opening later this spring, caps off (at least for this season) the high-minded version of this lackluster trend.
