LATC and Spring Street Redevelopment; Schism Over Equity Waiver Restructuring

Aside from the usual battles of the buck all theaters have to wage, the Los Angeles Theatre Center has had to combat its downtown location.

From the start everyone connected with LATC knew that Spring Street was a tough area. When the Community Redevelopment Agency helped establish the LATC complex in 1985, it counted on the presence of the theater to help tame the neighborhood.

It has, and it hasn’t. The theater is an asset thanks to the public it attracts, but redevelopment on Spring Street has been slow to catch up.

The Times on Monday ran a story on the intense drug trafficking apparently headquartered at the Alexandria Hotel across the street from the theater. Does focusing attention on that problem affect attendance at the theater?

“As far as actual attendance,” said LATC general manager Carol Baker Tharp, “I haven’t noticed any drop-off. If anything people feel pretty relieved that things may finally improve. The neighborhood poses an image problem. It’s largely a matter of people’s discomfort level with coming into another environment. There have been individual incidents, but few.”

The most publicized of these “incidents” occurred last October after a performance of “Elisabeth, Almost by Chance a Woman.” A disturbance on the street prevented theater patrons from leaving the building for about 30 minutes.

“It was an isolated case,” Tharp said. “Basically a problem of young people at a dance across the street. Tempers got hot and they carried them out onto the sidewalk.”

But it did raise everyone’s consciousness about security. Private security and police presence have been increased since then.

“We were particularly appreciative of (police) horse patrols during the holiday season,” Tharp said. “They’ve beefed up foot patrols and we see the black-and-white cars behind the building much more frequently.”

Robert Alaniz, Director of Public Affairs for the CRA concurred that “part of the plan for Spring Street was increasing police presence. The city,” he said, “is also in the process of leasing 150,000 square feet of office space at 600 S. Spring. Workers will be moving in early next year. And there are new buildings going up at Spring and 3rd. which will bring an additional 2,500 to 3,000 people into the area.”

On May 9, the CRA also is launching a campaign to spruce up the street.

“They’re talking about putting in trees, painting curbs, painting lampposts,” said Tharp. “They’re planning a competition to paint the insides of empty store-fronts and (expect to) circulate a newsletter about happenings on the street.”

Alaniz also expects increased street and alley sweeping activity.

“Commissioner Ed Avila has indicated public works would be willing to work with (property) owners to close off alleyways,” major venues of drug trafficking.

Will they be able to clean things up at Alexandria?

“Good question,” said Alaniz. “We’d love to see it rehabbed and brought back to a tourist hotel.”

Tharp is more pragmatic: “We see that (the police) are trying and we certainly wish them success.”

WAIVERING ON: Most actors won’t talk on the record, but there have been scattered reports of growing schisms over the stage actors’ union’s restructuring of the 16-year-old Equity Waiver plan, particularly among membership acting groups.

This is in marked contrast to the situation four years ago when the notion of restructuring first came up and was met by more widespread and vocal opposition.

The new Actors’ 99-Seat Theatre Plan (approved April 4 by an Actors’ Equity membership vote of 1,684 to 1,023) guarantees actors remuneration (Waiver does not) but also insists on complex other rules. Democratically run actors’ membership groups such as the Ensemble Studio Theatre, Theatre West and the Colony (to which actors pay dues to belong), are apparently finding their members deeply divided over this issue.

“Actors are worried,” said a person affiliated with one of these groups, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “They don’t know which camp to be in and some people are finding it hard to keep peace in the family. . . . “

“I wouldn’t be a bit surprised,” said Ted Schmitt, who runs the Waiver Cast Theatre, which is not a membership organization. “Money was not an issue in 1984. Money’s an issue now. Exploitation of actors was not an issue, but there have been high-budget Waiver productions recently that have made actors feel exploited. There’s more skepticism now.”

Schmitt is a member of the Equity Waiver Theatre Operators Committee, a group of about 40 people who run Waiver theaters and have declared the union’s new actors’ plan unworkable.

“I’ve had several conversations with actors who are in favor of money to actors, but there is no resistance on the part of the operators on pay for actors,” Schmitt insisted. “It’s the methodology (of payment) that’s up for debate.

“The larger philosophical question is can a labor union impose a payment on a group without bargaining or negotiations? We need clarification from the NLRB (National Labor Relations Board) and that is a process that’ll begin with a complaint. What we (operators) will do is continue to develop a workable revised agreement under which we believe everyone will be able to function.”