STAGE : La Jolla Playhouse Plays Beat the Fund-Raising Clock

Will the La Jolla Playhouse win its race against the clock? In a campaign of just over five weeks, the theater has raised 24% of its $1-million goal and nearly half of the $500,000 it needs to raise before Dec. 31 to ensure a 1990 season, a Playhouse official said this week. Gifts and pledges totaling $240,986 have come in from a variety of donors who decline to be identified, the spokeswoman said. Monthly progress reports are scheduled to come throughout the campaign, which is supposed to end June 30.

The theater has an accumulated deficit of $703,000, which has grown annually since the theater, revived in 1983, went through $1 million in seed money in 1986. Alan Levey, managing director of the theater, said this may be the first season in which the annual budget will be in the black.

He said key problems have been the length of the Playhouse season--shorter than any other League of Resident Theatres (LORT)) in the Playhouse’s category. The Playhouse shares venues with UC San Diego and offers limited seating at the Warren Theatre. Playhouse executives say plans to build the Weiss Forum in 1991 should alleviate the problem by adding 150 seats to the Warren. The theater hopes to build a third theater to allow for year-round operation.

Another problem is that the theater has fallen short of its own projections for donations and single-ticket sales. Charmaine Kaplan, a member of the Playhouse board, will seek donations as head of the financial stabilization campaign. Meanwhile, Playhouse executives say they’re encouraged by brisk ticket sales for its current production, “Macbeth,” at the Mandell Weiss. Only advance ticket sales for the Playhouse’s “80 Days” have been greater.

The theater sold standing-room-only spots during “Macbeth” previews and was filled almost to capacity Tuesday. But 100 tickets still remained Wednesday for the Pay What You Can matinee performance on Saturday, which costs only what individual theatergoers can afford to pay.

In its attempt to reach a wider audience, the theater has scheduled: an interpreted performance for the hearing-impaired Sunday that includes a pre-performance discussion on the theater deck led by deaf actress Freda Norman, and a limited number of $8 tickets for the hearing-impaired; $5 tickets for an Oct. 25 matinee at 1 p.m. for student groups; and student rush tickets for all performances, in which anyone with student identification can buy two half-price tickets a half hour before curtain time.

Come November, it will have been a year since the staging of “The Life of the Party,” the last production by Diversionary Theatre, San Diego’s only gay and lesbian theater company. In the interim, the theater’s board of directors parted company with artistic director and founder Thomas Vegh, now directing “The Deadly Game,” opening tonight at the La Jolla Stage Company.

The California Arts Council expressed confidence that the company would resume production in the form of a $1,100 grant. And the theater is likely to resume next year--possibly as early as February--with a three-play season, said Larry Oviatt, chairman of the board of trustees. Oviatt said a new artistic director will be announced soon and that the only real production holdup is the search for space.

On Wednesday, Oviatt had his mind less on Diversionary than on the earthquake that devastated the San Francisco Bay Area the day before. Steve Rosen, future son-in-law of a friend of Oviatt’s, wasn’t home when his apartment building, which was sitting on a landfill, collapsed. The fourth floor is now the first floor and Rosen’s apartment, which was on the first floor, is now nestled beneath the earth. Rosen, son of San Francisco Giants president Al Rosen, was at the World Series game in Candlestick Park when the earthquake hit, so Oviatt judges that this is one case in which being a fan actually spared someone’s life.

PROGRAM NOTES: Danny Simon liked the North Coast Repertory Theatre production of his brother Neil Simon’s “Broadway Bound” so much that he called his brother’s agent to say that if a touring company of the show ever gets off the ground, they ought to consider the North Coast lead--19-year-old Paul Epstein--for the part of Eugene. Audiences like the show, too. It has played to 86% capacity in the three-week run to date, 95% last weekend alone, and has been an unprecedented success for the theater, said artistic director Olive Blakistone, who just extended the show through Nov. 25. The only North Coast show that has come was “The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940” at 75%. “I hope it will be as successful for the Gaslamp,” said Blakistone of the theater that plans to present the San Diego professional premiere of “Broadway Bound” from Feb. 21-April 1. . . .

The Gaslamp Quarter Theatre can’t seem to get a break. First, North Coast did “Broadway Bound” before the Gaslamp’s scheduled date for the professional premiere of the show. Now, another Gaslamp season selection, “Party of One,” scheduled for March 14-May 5 at the newly named Elizabeth North Theatre, will play first at the Price Center Theatre at UC San Diego on Jan. 6. Ah, well, at least both shows have staying power. “Party of One,” a musical revue about being single, played for four years in San Francisco before closing and leaving for a national tour with the original cast. The January date marks the show’s first San Diego stop. . . .

Theater directors are counting on ticket demand for the Soviet arts festival theater events to climb as they inch closer to opening night--Sunday for San Diego Repertory Theatre’s “Slingshot” and Tuesday for Old Globe Theatre’s “Brothers and Sisters.” So far, the Globe is sold to less than half capacity for the American premiere of an epic theater production by the renowned Maly Theatre (which has sold out in every other city where its shows have appeared). The San Diego Repertory Theatre stands at 53% capacity for its world premiere directed in English by Soviet director Roman Viktyuk. Vicki Wolf, managing director of Sushi Performance Gallery, which is presenting the Soviet performance art group, Derevo , Nov. 3-5, feels right on schedule for Sushi’s 80-seat space with 10 tickets sold for the Friday night performance and six for the Saturday. . . .

The last bubble has not yet burst for “Suds,” the home-grown San Diego musical that played at the San Diego Repertory Theatre, the Old Globe Theatre and off-Broadway last year. It is scheduled for a May 1 production at La Mirada Civic Theatre in La Mirada as part of a subscription series. It will be the first “Suds” production done with a new director, new choreographer and new cast. The old cast keeps busy, too. Susan Mosher will star as Fanny Brice in “Funny Girl” at the Lawrence Welk Resort Theatre on Nov. 21-Jan. 27. . . .

Scripteasers, a 41-year-old organization dedicated to helping writers develop new work, will present its 16th showcase, a reading of three one-act plays at 8 p.m. Monday at the Elizabeth North Theatre. On the program is “A is A” and “Mixed Nuts,” by Gary Seger, and “Franklin,” by Laurence McGilvery and Justin McGilvery.