Le Cirque du Soleil Embroiled in Controversy Down Under, En Route to Santa Monica

California’s gain is Australia’s loss.

Le Cirque du Soleil’s return to Santa Monica in February, announced last week, was made possible only because Le Cirque, citing increased travel costs and a less than cordial welcome from some Australians, withdrew from its scheduled appearance in January at the Festival of Sydney. Le Cirque also pulled out of a tour through the rest of Australia that would have lasted through May.

The Festival of Sydney may take legal action.

“This was one of the bitterest experiences I’ve ever had,” said the Sydney Festival’s general manager Stephen Hall, adding that Le Cirque was featured in programs that had been printed and in an advertising campaign that had already begun. Last week, the festival’s board met to consider its legal options, but decided to await Le Cirque’s response to a letter sent by the board.

Earlier, “they (Le Cirque) did make an offer of reparations to us, $100,000 (in Australian currency),” said Hall, speaking prior to the board meeting. “But we didn’t think it was adequate.”

“It was our last offer,” Le Cirque’s marketing director Jean David said by phone Wednesday. He added that Le Cirque never signed a contract with Sydney.

“A contract can exist without a document being signed,” responded Hall.

The brouhaha began when the Australian Actors Equity and the country’s Circus Oz, the politicized new-wave outfit which was seen at the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival in Los Angeles, objected to Le Cirque’s plans, especially one week in which Le Cirque’s appearance in Sydney would have coincided with a Circus Oz run.

“We were very vulnerable to comparison with them,” said Circus Oz administrator Susan Provan, “and we thought we just couldn’t compete with their promotional campaign.” For example, Provan cited a Circus Oz engagement in Canberra that was scratched when the impresario heard of Le Cirque’s tour and “felt that they would take all the circus dollar there was.”

So Circus Oz asked Le Cirque “to revise their dates and not appear until four to six weeks after we did in any city,” said Provan. When Le Cirque wouldn’t budge, “we lodged a request with the immigration department to put pressure on them to alter their dates.”

The Australian government finally overruled the objections and granted Le Cirque the necessary visas, but by then the air fares had doubled in price (from what Le Cirque had expected to pay), said Le Cirque general manager Norman Latourelle.

Also, “we knew we were not 100% welcome,” he added. “And we didn’t want to compete with them (Circus Oz). Many of our artists used to be competitive athletes, and this is a choice we’ve made: no competition.” Le Cirque’s use of one ring illustrates this attitude; no one has to compete for the audience’s attention.

As for the Australian government, “we would still like the Canadians to be there,” said spokesman Terry Bransdon. “We would welcome them to Expo 88,” which will be held in Brisbane, Australia from April 30 to Oct. 30.

MUSICAL CHAIRS: “Nunsense,” initially scheduled to appear at the Henry Fonda Theatre in January, has postponed its opening until March 10. “We didn’t want to compete with ‘Me and My Girl,’ ” said “Nunsense” co-producer Pete Sanders, explaining why his show was delayed. “Me” opens on Jan. 15 at the Pantages, across the street from the Fonda. Both shows are included in the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera season.

Meanwhile, San Diego will see this company of “Me and My Girl” before Los Angeles does. The show previews Tuesday at San Diego Civic Theatre, opens Wednesday, and plays through Jan. 8.

Contrary to earlier announcements, “Me and My Girl” will not play the Orange County Performing Arts Center May 3-8. “The logistics of our tour made it impossible to accommodate Orange County,” said a spokesman for the show. The Center will replace “Me” with a touring production of “Cats,” but “we’re working to make sure we’ll get a new set of dates for ‘Me,’ within the current season”--which continues through the summer, according to Center publicist Richard Bryant.

DOOLITTLE DOINGS: The UCLA programmers who run the Doolittle Theatre hope to lure the National Theatre of Great Britain to Los Angeles in late 1988. Earlier plans to bring the British for the upcoming UK/LA Festival (Feb. 4-April 28) were derailed by prolonged labor negotiations at the National.

Meanwhile, next up at the Doolittle is John Houseman’s The Acting Company, performing “Kabuki Macbeth” Jan. 19-24 and “Much Ado About Nothing” Jan. 26-31. The Company’s other Southland stops: “Much Ado” at the Norris Theatre in Palos Verdes on Jan. 13, “Kabuki” at UC San Diego on Jan. 15, “Kabuki” on Jan. 16 and “Five By Tenn” (one-acts by Tennessee Williams) on Jan. 17 at UC Santa Barbara, and “Kabuki” at Pepperdine University Feb. 2.

SECOND STAGES: “Slaughterhouse on Tanner’s Close,” a tale of murder and mayhem in 19th century Scotland that created a stir at the tiny Pacific Theatre Ensemble in Venice last month, will move to Stages in Hollywood for a six-week run, opening Jan. 28.

Much of the comment about “Slaughterhouse” was caused by its unusual environmental staging, in which members of the audience sat atop scaffolds that lined opposite walls of the theater. Mobile scaffolds were also used in the show itself as flexible set pieces. Yet Stages “has a definite proscenium feeling to it,” said writer/director Daniel O’Connor, so he’ll have to adapt the staging--though he hasn’t figured out how.

The show couldn’t continue its run in Venice because another group within the Pacific Theatre Ensemble had booked the space.

MAROWITZ AND GOLDBERG: Charles Marowitz, iconoclastic director of the Los Angeles Theatre Center’s “What the Butler Saw,” may become the theater’s associate director/dramaturge, according to an LATC spokesman. The appointment is “under serious discussion, and it’s probably going to happen” . . . Whoopi Goldberg, a veteran of the San Francisco experimental theater before she became a movie star, has won the 12th annual California Theatre Award. She’ll pick it up at a benefit for the California Theatre Council’s Rainbow Casting Project, a program to promote theater jobs for minorities, at the Mark Taper Forum on Jan. 18. Details: (213) 874-3163.