ATTEMPT TO PRESENT ‘EINSTEIN’ IS BEACHED

Plans to present the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s production of the Robert Wilson-Philip Glass opera “Einstein on the Beach” in Los Angeles have been dropped, The Times has learned.

Over the weekend, an ad-hoc committee led by three locally based lawyers (Bernard Greenberg, Richard Sherwood and Stanley Grinstein) threw in the towel after a lengthy period of negotiations with the academy to bring the 8-year-old work to Los Angeles.

The collapse of negotiations marks the second time in less than a year that plans to mount a Wilson-Glass operatic collaboration here have failed. Last summer, an effort to present the much ballyhooed “CIVIL warS” here during the Olympic Arts Festival also was scrubbed.

“Einstein on the Beach” apparently was the casualty of a lagging fund-raising effort. “The amount of money required to sign the contracts (with the Brooklyn Academy) was such that we felt it couldn’t be raised,” Greenberg said. “As time passed, the budget became more fully fleshed out, and seemed to increase.” The final figure, he says, was nearly double the original sum, which was earlier reported as $200,000.

The 4 1/2-hour production originally was to have been presented here in February but scheduling problems and other difficulties forced one postponement after another. From the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s point of view, time was decidedly a factor.

“We absolutely expected to come out,” said Joe Melillo, who served as director of the academy’s Next Wave Festival, which presented “Einstein” for a dozen performances in December.

“We were named by the Byrd Hoffman Foundation (the organization that represents Wilson) as representatives for the production from December until March 1, at which time we had agreed to return it to the foundation. The three men who wanted to produce it in Los Angeles just couldn’t make a commitment by last Friday (March 1).”

Melillo quoted $320,000 as the sum needed to “deliver the full artistic production” to California. Greenberg would not comment on that figure.

Last-ditch plans had called for six performances in August at Pasadena Civic Auditorium. “Even with a 75% capacity house, there would be a major (financial) shortfall,” Greenberg indicated.

After the original February plans fell through, Greenberg continued to work on the project. “We knew it was a long shot. Still, I tried to get all the local arts organizations to come together and do something in a joint fashion,” he pointed out.

Greenberg is on the board of the Music Center Opera Assn., which promised $50,000 toward the project. He declined to enumerate other cash commitments.

“We need to develop available resources to get these kinds of productions presented,” he stated. “Right now, the work of such artists as Wilson and Glass seems to fall between the existing organizations. What we need is a new foundation.

“We (the ad-hoc committee of Greenberg, Sherwood and Grinstein) are really sad about this. But I think we have increased the public’s awareness of Wilson’s work. I still believe there are a significant number of people in our art community who are interested in things that are different.”

Would he consider going back to square one and negotiating with the Byrd Hoffman Foundation itself? Greenberg seemed doubtful. Again, fund raising would become the major hurdle, he said. Ironically, this week in Cambridge, Mass., the “Cologne” version of “CIVIL warS” (excerpts from Acts III and IV) is receiving its U.S. premiere by the American Repertory Theatre.