Kevin Aratari

Less than a year after it was launched, the small but ambitious Vanguard Theatre Ensemble has run into management problems that cast a cloud over its future. Vanguard producer Kevin Aratari and artistic director Terry Gunkel, founders of the storefront troupe, have decided to break up their team effort due to "irreconcilable differences." Aratari said Thursday the official announcement of his departure will be made next week.

Less than a year after it was launched, the small but ambitious Vanguard Theatre Ensemble has run into management problems that cast a cloud over its future. Vanguard producer Kevin Aratari and artistic director Terry Gunkel, founders of the storefront troupe, have decided to break up their team effort due to "irreconcilable differences." Aratari said Thursday the official announcement of his departure will be made next week.

They say they decided to start their own theater company three years ago, and you have to take them at their word. Because, with only days to go before the opening of their first season, the space they've leased in a nondescript industrial park here provides scant evidence of long-range preparation.

They say they decided to start their own theater company three years ago, and you have to take them at their word. Because, with only days to go before the opening of their first season, the space they've leased in a nondescript industrial park here provides scant evidence of long-range preparation.

Actors' Equity has turned down a bid by the Vanguard Theatre Ensemble to join with three Orange County theaters in their proposal that the union extend its 99-Seat Plan to their venues. If approved, the three amateur theater companies would be allowed to hire union-professional performers at token wages during a one-year trial period.

The Vanguard Theatre Ensemble will open its 1993 season with Oscar Wilde's comedy "The Importance of Being Earnest," the group has announced. "Earnest" will play at the ensemble's 68-seat theater from Jan. 7 to Feb. 6. Other plays in the season include: "Equus" by Peter Shaffer (March 4 to April 3); Arthur Miller's "The Crucible" (May 6 to June 5); "Present Laughter" by Noel Coward (July 1-31); Shakespeare's "Othello" (Aug. 26 to Sept.

Bahram Nour-Omid has been named chairman of RiverOne, a Westlake Village-based provider of software services to the electronics manufacturing industry. Nour-Omid is currently a senior principal of venture fund Shelter Capital Partners and was founder of StudioXchange. Jean Prewitt, president of AFMA, has been promoted to chief executive of the trade association formerly known as the American Film Marketing Assn. Jim Lefler has been promoted to president and chief operating officer of Andrew L.

Shakespeare Orange County, a recently formed professional troupe at Chapman University in Orange, raised $2,850 on Sunday at a lecture it sponsored by Charles Vere, Earl of Burford, who claims that his ancestor is the real author of Shakespeare's plays. SOC artistic director Thomas F.

In one of George Bernard Shaw's mock newspaper interviews to drum up advance word for the 1894 premiere of "Arms and the Man," the playwright was asked whether his new comedy was a skit. "The question proved a most unfortunate one," the reporter noted. "Mr. Shaw positively ground his teeth with rage."

Sunday's Super Bowl XLVII ratings were a little like the San Francisco 49ers' offense: Still powerful, but not quite at peak form. In a marathon game marred by an unprecedented 34-minute blackout at the Superdome in New Orleans, an average of 108.4 million total viewers tuned in to CBS and watched the Baltimore Ravens defeat the 49ers, 34-31, according to Nielsen. That was down 3% from last year's Super Bowl telecast, when 111.3 million tuned in. That event remains the No. 1 ratings champion in U.S. history.

Any production of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" usually clocks in at three hours even when the pace is brisk and the mordant humor is allowed to zip along. But if the pulsating wisecracks of Edward Albee's corrosive marital epic are turned into mere recriminations and buried beneath a portentous tone, as they are in the current revival by the Vanguard Theatre Ensemble, those three hours can seem like an eternity.