L.A ‘Lettice’ Production Still on Hold

One of the casualties of last year’s L.A. theater season was Peter Shaffer’s “Lettice & Lovage,” which was a Broadway hit in 1990 following its initial success in London. Though the touring production with Julie Harris reached San Diego last July, the late summer run at Century City’s Shubert Theatre was canceled.

At the time, Shubert President Bernard Jacobs blamed bad box office in other cities, but also noted that his company had promised Shaffer a Los Angeles booking.

Don’t hold your breath. The show, still with Harris, is now in the middle of a three-month tour, primarily in the East and South. L.A. isn’t on the itinerary. And at the Shubert, the mezzanine/balcony renovation requested by Andrew Lloyd Webber--as part of the deal to bring his new “Sunset Boulevard” there--is underway.

The renovation is expected to be completed by late May, just in time for “Crazy for You,” followed by “Sunset Boulevard” in the fall. Then, if it takes as long for the sun to set on “Sunset” as it has for, say, Lloyd Webber’s “Phantom of the Opera,” it’s not likely that the Shubert will be free any time soon.

Shaffer’s agent Robert Lantz said Shubert officials recently repeated their assurances that the play will come to L.A., “but I would think later rather than sooner.” As for now, “scheduling problems are insurmountable.”

Some observers have long questioned whether the 1,825-seat Shubert isn’t too big for the Shaffer play. Lantz said only that Shaffer hopes his “small comedy” will come “to a normal-sized theater.”

“TAMARA” WATCH: Barrie Wexler has been producing “Tamara” in Los Angeles since before it opened in 1984, working for the executive producer, Canadian media mogul Moses Znaimer. But now Wexler--with his partner and wife Lynn Z. Wexler--is capo di tutti capi at Il Vittoriale, the Hollywood home of the production’s Italian intrigues.

The Wexlers bought rights to the L.A. production from Znaimer for “fair market value,” said Barrie Wexler, who wouldn’t be more specific. Potential revenue for the production has risen this year, as capacity was increased from 140 to 170 with the addition of risers in some of the rooms.

The Wexlers are also negotiating the purchase of worldwide rights to “Tamara” and are working on another interactive show, a ‘20s Hollywood tale tentatively titled “Hotel Hollywood,” which they hope to open on Hollywood Boulevard in 1994.

EQUITY LOOKS WEST: Here’s an unusual twist: Actors’ Equity is giving money to producers. The union’s foundation awarded $500 each to Shakespeare Festival/LA and the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum for their efforts to work with Equity contracts despite their lack of deep pockets.

The grants to the two nonprofit L.A. theaters, plus the Empty Space in Seattle, are the first such awards to West Coast theaters in the history of the New York-based program, dating back about 15 years, said George Ives, the union’s Western Regional Director and now a trustee of the foundation. Previously, “I don’t think anybody ever bothered to find out about companies out here,” he said. A local committee recommended Western companies to the final selection committee.

Equity is also recognizing the West by instituting regional representation on its national governing council, thanks to a recently passed constitutional amendment. The union’s council has been New York-dominated, but now each of three regions (Western, Central, Eastern) will be proportionally represented.

APPLAUSE: Here’s a New Year’s resolution for theater managers: Be as solicitous of your subscribers as Marnie Duke Mitze, managing director of the Smothers Theatre at Pepperdine University.

When a touring production of “Jerry’s Girls” wasn’t up to her standards, Mitze offered two complimentary tickets for any other production during the season to those subscribers who had selected “Jerry’s” as part of their package.

The performance in question was “at best a preview,” with “enormous sound problems” and “made-up lyrics,” said Mitze. She felt her subscribers “need to know we assure artistic quality.”