STRONG MEASURES TAKEN TO OFFSET WEAKER DOLLAR

“I wake up every day, and the first thing I do is check the currency,” said Robert Fitzpatrick, director of the Los Angeles Festival. “The month of December alone has probably cost the festival $300,000 in the (dollar’s) decline against the French franc, the Japanese yen and the deutsche mark.”

He considers the currency issue monumental, and referred to a recent luncheon round-table where he also discussed money matters: “I wasn’t being facetious when I said I felt I was representing some banana republic.”

“In 1984,” said Fitzpatrick who also directed the Olympic Arts Festival, “every single artist was not only willing but delighted to have a contract in dollars. In this festival, the majority of artists have absolutely insisted that they be paid in their own ‘dollars.’ We have lost 25% to 30% of our buying power for this festival, and that’s astronomical.”

As a result, Fitzpatrick has cut a planned 4 1/2-week schedule to 3 1/2 weeks, and a speculative $8-million budget to $6 million. “We made that decision in October as we watched the dollar continue to decline. The dollars are no longer able to buy us the same thing.”

Later, Fitzpatrick was forced to all but cancel a planned production of Pierre Marivaux’s “Triumph of Love” by West Berlin’s Schaubuhne theater. He had hoped to have the theater make its U.S. debut at the festival with the 18th-Century comedy. Over the months, Fitzpatrick watched the cost of bringing the Schaubuhne here exceed $100,000, and finally telexed West Berlin: Because of “the extraordinary decline of the American dollar (it does) not appear to be possible” to have the Schaubuhne come.

“The only caveat is that, if it develops, we get a new sponsor who comes through with $125,000, then we might reopen negotiations,” Fitzpatrick said, “but by that time it may not be possible anyway.”

Currency decline, a potential for visa problems, what Fitzpatrick refers to as “post-Olympic tristesse”-- and Pope John Paul II’s arrival in the middle of the festival schedule--are some of the problems confronting the artistic director.

He also has had considerable breaks--not the least of which has been the determination of top city officials, led by Mayor Tom Bradley and Maureen Kindel, president of the Board of Public Works and chairwoman of the Los Angeles Festival, to ensure that the festival takes place.

Meanwhile, the “Mahabharata” contract with Peter Brook’s company is in francs, “and that’s a huge contract.” The contract with Ingmar Bergman and Stockholm’s Royal Dramatic Theater, for Strindberg’s “Miss Julie” is in dollars--”with considerable effort.”

To date the festival has $4.2 million in its coffers from public and private sources; an additional $1 million to $1.5 million will come from ticket sales, leaving $600,000 to $800,000 to be raised.

The linchpin in this mix is the receipt of $2 million in post-Olympic money. Nearly two years ago, the boards of the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee and its charitable foundation, the Amateur Athletic Foundation, amended their bylaws to permit funding of the arts festival, and the foundation voted to approve the money. It is hardly surprising that Peter Ueberroth, former LAOOC president, Paul Ziffren, former LAOOC board chairman, and Kindel are among the festival’s board members.

And $1 million came from the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency.

Corporate sponsors for the festival are the Times Mirror Co., $500,000; Occidental Petroleum, $250,000 and Security Pacific, $125,000. A minimum sponsorship is $125,000.

Other major donors include General Motors, AT&T; and Trans-america, ranging from $35,000 to $75,000 and, said Fitzpatrick, “We are in the process of exploring with them whether they wish to increase to full sponsorship.”

The National Endowment for the Arts has awarded $65,000 to the festival. Also, the French government is underwriting transportation costs of French companies.

Fitzpatrick said the festival has tried to be “sensible and careful” not to compete with Los Angeles artistic organizations that are raising funds. Most of the funding “has come from the Olympic surplus, which could not have gone to anything except the sports program. The CRA gave us $1 million because we fostered their objectives. And in my conversation with (corporate sponsors), I very specifically asked for support which would be over and above what they are now contributing to Los Angeles cultural institutions.

“Inevitably, there is a potential for competition. I don’t think any organization--the Music Center or otherwise--has a divine right toward all the dollars.”

To avert visa difficulties for international artists, the festival operation is requiring them to submit passport information well in advance. Because of a change in Immigration and Naturalization Service regulations, Fitzpatrick said, certain artistic presenters such as the Brooklyn Academy of Music have been experiencing difficulties in hosting foreign artists.

Fitzpatrick is also facing massive logistical and safety issues. “The trial that is taking place over the ‘Twilight Zone’ film has made every official extremely cautious,” he said. “ ‘Mahabharata’ uses lots of fire and water and battle scenes. We are making sure that all of these elements are extremely safe, and that they appear extremely safe.

“The problem that is far more difficult for us is the Pope,” Fitzpatrick said, referring to the pontiff’s Sept. 15-16 visit.

“Having the Pope is equivalent to having a monsoon. This sudden ecclesiastical deluge. What do I do with hundreds of bishops and thousands of nuns? The logistics of a two- to three-day visit of the Pope based in downtown Los Angeles, and in one particular case in a festival venue, the Japan America Theatre. We had to rearrange our entire dance schedule because of the Pope’s visit.”

Fitzpatrick worries that 2 1/2 years after the Olympics, there is now “a surprising degree of caution in both the public and private sectors. ‘Can we take one more initiative? Can we afford a festival? Will the audiences show up? Were the Olympics just a fluke? Maybe we shouldn’t be so ambitious. . . . ‘

“I love taking risks, but not dumb risks,” Fitzpatrick said. “And this is a risk well worth taking. . . . This city has been living for so many years on hype that when it gets the real thing, it’s not sure how to digest it.”