Grove’s Manager Resigns : Theater: Shakespeare troupe’s managing director Barbara Hammerman cites personal and professional reasons for the unexpected move. It is uncertain whether her job will be filled.

Barbara Hammerman has resigned unexpectedly as managing director and executive vice president of GroveShakespeare after a sometimes stormy 2 1/2-year tenure, the troupe announced Friday.

Hammerman presided over a bitter power struggle that led in 1991 to the ouster of Grove founder and artistic director Thomas F. Bradac, who went on to form his own classical repertory company, Shakespeare Orange County (see review, this page).

On the brighter side, she was credited with landing GroveShakespeare’s biggest grant ever, $250,000 from the Anaheim-based Leo Freedman Foundation last year. (However, the troupe received no money in the latest round of Freedman grants announced Friday.

GroveShakespeare artistic director W. Stuart McDowell said Hammerman announced her resignation Thursday and that she cited both personal and professional reasons. The decision was entirely Hammerman’s, McDowell said.

Hammerman could not be reached for comment.

According to a press release, she is leaving to spend more time with her family and also wants to devote time to her duties as president of the North Orange County Community College District, and as president of the Orange County Planned Giving Roundtable, a professional association that promotes charity.

She will continue as managing director for two weeks and has offered to be available to assist the company during a 60-day transition.

“We’re very disappointed,” board of trustees president David Krebs said. “She’s contributed a lot to the organization.”

“We’re losing a great asset to the company,” McDowell added. “Fortunately, we have a very good board and a very good staff now in place.”

Indeed, Hammerman may not be replaced.

“We’re not certain at this point,” McDowell answered when asked how and when a new managing director would be hired. The executive committee of the company’s board of trustees will meet in the weeks ahead to discuss a possible restructuring of the position, according to Krebs.

Hammerman’s resignation comes after the departure in mid-October of general manager Charles Johanson. That position was restructured and retitled “business manager,” and Steve Boyer recently was named to the post.

The managing director has been “in charge of the basic business of the company,” McDowell said. Responsibilities include financial management, marketing and fund-raising. The business manager’s duties are more involved with the day-to-day operation.

Hammerman took over as managing director in February, 1990. Some of the rockiest moments of her tenure came in mid-1991 when Bradac was forced to resign. Hammerman reportedly was behind the ouster, which led to a widely publicized rift in the company. Bradac subsequently founded Shakespeare Orange County, taking with him several GroveShakespeare veterans.

GroveShakespeare hired McDowell last March after nine months with an acting artistic director, Jules Aaron.

Bradac said Friday that he was “a little surprised” by the announcement of Hammerman’s resignation. “I wish GroveShakespeare the best,” he said, “and I hope this means all the administrative turmoil they’ve been through in the last couple of years is over.”

Earlier this week, a disgruntled independent theater producer who had rented the Grove’s Gem Theatre last summer asked city officials to review its five-year contract with GroveShakespeare, under which the troupe operates the city-owned indoor Gem and the outdoor Festival Amphitheatre. The producer had alleged financial improprieties, but the City Council declined to order a review. It did, however, call for a discussion next month about the Grove’s policy on rentals to outside users.