Reason Turns to Bitterness in Dispute Between Union, Theater League

David Rosenak sounds like a reasonable man. He says all he wants is the chance for the members of his union, the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, to make a living sufficient to remain in the theater.

“We are dealing with theatrical institutions that have grown enormously,” Rosenak, the society’s executive secretary, said recently from New York. “They invested millions of dollars in buildings. They hired business managers. They expanded their staffs. They bought computers. Now we want a commitment to the artists.”

David Emmes also sounds like a reasonable man. He, too, says he wants directors to make a decent living. But if all the union’s demands are met, he says, it would seriously threaten the survival of many small professional theaters already teetering on the financial brink.

“The people at SSDC are well intended and, indeed, artists in the American theater are not paid as much as they should be,” said Emmes, who happens to be in the union as well as co-founder of South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa, a member of the League of Resident Theaters with whom the union has broken off contract negotiations.

South Coast Repertory is the only league theater in Orange County, among seven statewide and 67 nationwide.

“Happily, SCR is regarded as one of the better-paying theaters,” Emmes continued. “But finally, the rubber meets the road. We have to raise more than $1.5 million a year just to keep the wolf from the door. Everybody is caught in some sort of funding crunch.”

Though they both sound reasonable, Rosenak and Emmes are also adamant about their respective positions. And their dulcet tones turn less agreeable when asked to predict what will happen if the union’s 1,033 members nationwide decide to support their executive board and reject the league’s final contract offer in voting scheduled for Monday in New York, June 15 in Los Angeles and June 17 in Chicago.

“It’s simple,” Rosenak said. “If we don’t get back to the bargaining table, we will definitely have a full work stoppage later in the summer, sometime in August. And we will hold up all productions for the fall season.”

For his part, Emmes has no doubt that in the event of a strike South Coast Repertory will be able to get by very well, thank you. “We are capable of mounting an entire season without a contract,” he maintained. “And it would be every bit as strong artistically.”

Both Emmes and the theater’s artistic director, Martin Benson, say they would resign from the union, if need be, to stage the productions they already have planned. Additionally, they would hire free-lance directors who are not members of the stage directors and choreographers union. Ironically, they say, the theater’s director fees already meet the scale being asked by the union.

Rosenak said the union has proposed that mid-size “B” theaters such as South Coast Repertory pay directors a minimum of $8,000 for a production with a 4-week rehearsal period. The current minimum is $6,986. The league has made a counter offer of $7,500.

The major point of contention is the smallest “D” theaters. The union is asking a minimum fee of $2,750 for directing a play with three weeks of rehearsal. The union also wants all productions at these theaters to be covered at the end of six years. The Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers’ contract that lapsed on May 26 required only two union productions per season in “D” theaters. The minimum fee was $2,541.

(Theater sizes are defined according to average weekly box-office receipts. The 507-seat SCR Mainstage has operated under a contract for “B” theaters because it grosses between $33,000 and $55,499 per week. The 161-seat SCR Second Stage has operated as a “D” theater because it grosses $17,999 or less. Since 1985, league theaters have been filing union contracts for their second stages. However, the league now maintains that these are not covered. The union disagrees, and the matter has gone to arbitration.)

“If a director is lucky,” Rosenak said, “he gets to do four or five productions a year. Multiply those minimums by five and you see the kind of compensation we’re talking about. We’re simply asking LORT to take a collective responsibility for artists who make it all possible.”

Rosenak said the union had been negotiating with the theaters since February. After both sides “seemed to have reached their bottom lines,” he said, “we suggested bringing in a federal mediator. The league considered that and told us they would reject a federal mediator.”

It was at that point, he said, that the union left the bargaining table. Emmes sees the situation somewhat differently: “After the negotiations hit an impasse they said, ‘We will just promulgate a contract.’ I think the union was misguided and naive to think it could unilaterally impose a contract on the league. They thought enough theaters would sign. But the conditions were onerous.”

The union was formed 30 years ago when Bob Fosse refused to direct “Little Me” on Broadway unless he got an SSDC contract, Rosenak said. That forced the League of New York Theaters, as it was then called, to recognize the union. The Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers signed its first contract with the league in 1972.