Theatre League Alliance Formed in Merger; L.A. Public Theatre Moves Out of the Coronet

One of the missing pieces in Los Angeles theater has been a responsive service organization to address the needs of local theaters--from the major players to the minor leagues.

Previous attempts to create such an outfit (the Los Angeles Theater Alliance, the League of Producers and Theaters of Greater Los Angeles) all proved less than satisfactory. In June, however, the alliance and the league merged to form the Theatre League Alliance, a slightly redundant title conveniently abbreviated to Theatre/LA.

Housed in the restored Engine Company 28 firehouse downtown, it has a newly elected board and 59 member theaters. Executive director Karen Rushfield calls that “a nice total” of commercial, nonprofit, educational and community theaters, as well as a few independent producers. The board, which is drawn from all those categories, is planning a retreat Aug. 27 to discuss goals, encompassing new marketing strategies (“We’re looking at a half-price ticket plan”) and insurance (“a great need”).

“We’re also starting a series of workshops on funding opportunities,” Rushfield continued in a litany of deja vu . “I want workshops on grants, grant writing, corporate fund-raising and earned income possibilities such as schools, classes and merchandising.”

Also on the list is a series of round tables and the start of a volunteer bank. With a minimum of time and resources, Rushfield hopes theaters can be provided with all manner of free help--from ushers to consultants.

“As far as I know,” she said, “that hasn’t been done before.”

Encouraging as all this sounds, it’s too early to tell how well Theatre/LA will succeed where the other organizations failed. Meanwhile, it has been the Theatre Council (which services the needs of theaters statewide as well as in Ashland, Ore.) that has best filled the Los Angeles void.

It, too, however, is in transition. In June, council executive director Robert Holley returned to the East Coast. Board president Stephen J. Albert decided that might be a good time to look at other changes as well. Albert has canvassed member theaters for new goals to be explored at an Oct. 12 theater caucus that will precede the annual Congress of the California Confederation of the Arts in Costa Mesa.

The caucus will follow a symposium in nontraditional casting set for Oct. 10 and 11 at the Japan-America Theatre, sponsored by the council in partnership with El Paso Natural Gas through a grant from the Burlington Northern Foundation and in association with Theatre/LA ( (213) 874-3163).

“We’ve retired the (council’s) accumulated deficit over the last two years,” Albert said. “We want to establish a basis for moving forward. The confederation is a major partner. Our objectives are to complete everything we’ve been funded to do through early October (symposium included) and use the caucus to plan for the future.”

Asked if last week’s announcement that the California Arts Council might restore some of the arts cuts made by the governor would be significant for the theater community, Albert said: “Anything that’s going to generate funds can significantly help. The arts have not been a priority of the governor in this administration.”

TIME PASSING: The lease is up on the Coronet Theatre and Peg Yorkin’s now-defunct L.A. Public Theatre is--wistfully--moving out. This marks the end of an era that began in the mid-’70s with summer Shakespeare at the John Anson Ford Theatre and in the parks, then broadened its scope to include other playwrights and become a year-round indoor operation, most recently at the Coronet.

Yorkin, left the theater in 1986 because “our natural audiences are dying off and our younger people are going to VCRs. The last three plays we did all got very good reviews--and no audiences.”

If you can’t beat them . . . Yorkin herself has now moved into film and video, heads Peg Yorkin Productions and is chair of the Fund for the Feminist Majority, an organization dedicated to achieving the feminization of power in all aspects of American life.

BAKER BITS: Jamie Baker’s “Don’t Go Back to Rockville,” which made quite a splash in a brief run at the Pacific Theatre Ensemble in January, is returning in a new staging as a co-production at and with the Victory Theatre.

Matt McKenzie, Holly Todd and Andrew Philpot are the only members of the original cast who will re-create their roles in this saga of love and long shots among the jockeys, set in a tavern a few blocks from Churchill Downs.

“Everyone else is working,” said writer-director Baker, explaining why the rest of the company will be new. Thomas Buderwitz will do the set (he earlier did the set for the Dr. Seuss-inspired “Midsummer Night’s Dream” that played the Westwood last year).

“Rockville” opens Sept. 22 for eight weeks and could go to an indefinite run. Meanwhile, “South Central Rain,” another segment of Baker’s “Triple Crown Trilogy” (to which “Rockville” belongs), opens next Thursday in workshop at the Pacific Theatre Ensemble.