Opera Pacific Chief Quits to Give Family More Time

Martin Weil, managing director of Opera Pacific, will resign effective May 31 to spend more time with his family, company officials announced Tuesday.

Weil also wants to devote more time to arts-advocacy efforts, he said.

A national search will be conducted for Weil’s successor, according to company officials.

“It’s really time for me to spend time with my family,” Weil said. “We just had a new baby girl in February, the week that (Opera Pacific’s) ‘Norma’ opened. We also have a 2-year-old boy. They’re both young, and they don’t know me. . . . I’m sort of a family person at heart. . . .

“I’m also very concerned about the environment that is changing for the arts, both in the state and locally. We need some new thinking and new directions in public support of the arts.”

Weil said that he has enough money saved to take the summer off and that he will look for a new job in the fall.

After a stint as executive director of the San Francisco-based Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Weil joined Opera Pacific in December, 1986, as the company’s first managing director. His duties were to oversee and coordinate marketing, development, financial planning and volunteer activities.

For the last 2 years, he was also a member of the board of directors of the California Confederation of the Arts and, in 1987, was a member of the music panel of the California Arts Council.

Earlier this month, Weil was among a group of county arts representatives who went to Sacramento as part of the annual Arts Day sponsored by the confederation to lobby key legislators about Gov. George Deukmejian’s proposed $3-million cut in the council’s budget for fiscal 1990.

Weil said he intends to remain in Orange County.