THEATER NOTES : Long Beach Staging Comeback

Long Beach Civic Light Opera won’t present any mainstage musicals this year, but just wait till next year.

So said company officials as they announced last week that 1996 will be devoted to fund-raising, including a series of “Best of Broadway” concerts and efforts by a new executive council made up of local CEOs.

Some 17,800 subscribers paid for a 1995-96 season that was to have included “Pippin,” “Evita” and “My Fair Lady” on top of the already staged “Nite Club Confidential.” The bankruptcy court supervising LBCLO’s Chapter 11 filing will be asked to approve a plan whereby those subscribers would get a show for free in each of the next three regular seasons. Future subscription revenue would be placed in escrow for production purposes only--so the money would be returned to subscribers if a show is canceled.

J. Phillip Keene III, executive director, said it would have cost approximately $700,000 per show to continue the season. Smaller substitute shows were considered, but “the decision was that it would be more to our subscribers’ liking, albeit they have to wait, for us to come back with full-scale musicals.”

A proposal from Theater League, which presents shows in Thousand Oaks and Glendale, to add Long Beach to its circuit was rejected, Keene said. Long Beach was concerned about retaining autonomy, he acknowledged, and the Theater League idea “still would have required us to raise significant capital.”

Jerold Franks, LBCLO’s new artistic director, will organize the “Best of Broadway” fund-raisers. Primarily a casting director (and twice elected president of the Casting Society of America), Franks also has produced many staged tributes to celebrities. His experience with full-fledged musicals is much more limited. Keene said Franks will continue as artistic director next year, when the musicals return.

The group may have a new name by then. While much remains in doubt, Keene said he’s convinced “the community, political leaders and the patrons believe this is an organization worth salvaging.”

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SHAKESPEARE SIBLINGS: England’s Moving Theatre, run by siblings Vanessa and Corin Redgrave, moved to Houston’s Alley Theatre for a four-week run ending last Sunday.

Using cast members from both companies, the two theaters presented Vanessa Redgrave directing and starring in “Antony and Cleopatra” and her brother directing and starring in “Julius Caesar.” The critics agreed that Redgrave the actress’ final moments as Cleopatra were remarkable, but there was some dissent over the stagings.

The companies now plan a very different collaboration: Tennessee Williams’ unproduced 1938 prison drama, “Not About Nightingales.”