Everyone's a Critic

By BONNIE HARRIS

Feb. 20, 2000 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Like squabbling children worn out by their own stubbornness, the city of Laguna Beach and the Festival of Arts have taken a timeout.

The spat that started it all--whether the popular summertime art venue is paying too much in rent--is no longer the real issue, a common digression in tiffs that result in bruised egos and volleyed blame. Neither side can truly remember how it got where it is now, how a 68-year city tradition could disintegrate so quickly, how the simple idea of enriching people’s lives with art and tableaux vivants could become so mired in politics and money and misguided loyalties. It has split the organization’s board and pitted artists against the festival where for years they have shown their work.

“Everything went from bad to worse until we finally felt like we were banging our heads against the wall,” said festival President Sherri Butterfield.

Adds City Manager Kenneth C. Frank: “I don’t know what happened. Things just kind of went straight to hell.”

About 160 artists show off their work in booths at the festival, which also runs the quirky but internationally known Pageant of the Masters, a display of live people posing as works of art, set to live orchestral music. It always seemed like a perfect match: Laguna Beach, with its reputation as an artists’ colony, and an arts festival that attracts 225,000 visitors to the city each year--along with their $6 million in expenditures on food, parking and trinkets at local shops.

Now the festival has entered into talks with San Clemente for a 20-acre site. And that has some people on both sides wondering: What would Laguna Beach be without the pageant it proudly advertises itself as the home of? What sort of arts festival would this be, dislocated from the picturesque town it has called home for nearly 70 years?

For years, the city and the festival have quarreled over annual rent payments, which amount to more than $500,000. For years, the festival has threatened to take its show elsewhere. And for years, the city has managed to strike a deal, even at the 11th hour, to keep it there.

So when, some 42 months ago, the two sides started talking rent again for the current lease, which ends in September 2001, both figured things could be the same. The demands would come, followed by the threats. Some concessions would be made, and a deal would be struck.

Not this time.

The festival decided to redefine itself for the first time, making it clear to city officials that its vision for the next 20 years--the length of the next lease agreement--called for unprecedented growth and at least $30 million in capital improvements at the aging Laguna Canyon Road site. The work ranged from additional parking and restroom remodeling to major stage expansions for the pageant.

At first the city responded as it always has. It waited. When festival officials touted offers from at least six other cities that were trying to lure the show away, Laguna Beach council members shrugged it off again.

“Honestly, we didn’t pay much attention to it,” Frank said. “We thought it was a negotiating ploy. It had been before.”

Despite what Butterfield and other festival officials described as an impasse in negotiations last fall, Frank said the city remained optimistic that “logic would prevail.” He held that view until two weeks ago, when the festival entered into exclusive negotiations with San Clemente.

Then, days ago, Frank said he saw a videotape that showed Butterfield at a San Clemente City Council meeting. Promises of a bigger site, a 3,000-seat amphitheater (the Irvine Bowl, where the pageant now shows, has 2,000), a 15,000-square-foot museum and some 2,000 parking spaces (parking is in continual shortage in Laguna Beach) swirled through the discussions.

“We are certainly grateful for this opportunity to spend some time exploring this opportunity with you,” Butterfield gushed at that council meeting. “It’s an excellent opportunity . . . and we hope it results in a match.”

Suddenly it seemed clear that Laguna Beach was in real danger of losing the festival. And city officials became suspicious of the festival’s real motive in redefining itself now. Perhaps they intended to leave all along, some thought. Its current site is a fourth the size of the San Clemente land, and Laguna Beach, which is fairly well built out, has little more to offer.

“In retrospect, I think the festival changed its vision to have a more grandiose image of what the Pageant of the Masters is,” Frank said. “If what San Clemente is offering them is their vision now, it can’t happen here. That vision can’t be accommodated in Laguna Beach.”

For their part, festival board members say it’s up to Laguna Beach to keep them there. For decades, they have been self-sustaining, giving back to the community with countless hours of volunteer work and art education. Now it’s the city’s turn to give back to us, they said. Lower our rent. Pay for the improvements we so desperately need. Give us more control over how our volunteer-earned revenue is spent.

“I believe the city of Laguna Beach simply doesn’t want us any more,” Butterfield told a crowd of artists last week. “I feel like we’re the old aunt who moved in and stayed too long.”

Things have become more tangled ever since, which tends to happen with any long-running squabble, particularly in a community where everyone has an opinion and few are afraid to state theirs. This one has fractured the festival’s very own membership now, with artists bent on keeping the show in its birthplace lashing out at the board members who are supposed to represent them.

Last week, more than 100 of the festival’s 160 exhibitors signed a petition to recall the board if it did not resume negotiations with Laguna Beach and drop all discussions with San Clemente. Alarmed that their troops were revolting, board members invited the artists to a special meeting. It did not go well.

“We have a historic interest in Laguna Beach and 68 years should count for something,” artist Michael Jacques told the board. “Since you are all so sure about going on to San Clemente, you should go on. The artists want to stay here. We don’t want to go and we’re not joined at your hip.”

In another twist, the controversy has managed to splinter even the board members. Longtime festival member David Young has sided with the artists, a move he said has alienated him from the other eight board members.

“I’ve made real enemies on the board over this,” said Young, the only festival official not targeted in the artists’ recall effort. “Some of my good friends don’t even speak to me anymore.”

Lost in the mix are residents and other festival supporters who have started wondering for the first time what would happen if the biggest show in town really did leave. Could one survive without the other?

“No to both,” said Arnold Hano, a city resident for 50 years. “The festival’s entire ambience, its whole essence, is Laguna. And without the festival, we would become a town without a soul.”

And yet no one, at this point, will venture a guess as to what will happen next. Both sides acknowledge each other’s importance, but neither is willing to take the first step toward kissing and making up.

“At any time, the city could call us up and make us an offer on the lease situation, a meaningful offer that we could consider,” Butterfield said. “Nothing is stopping them. But do you hear the phone ringing? I don’t.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Festival of Arts Facts:

When started: 1932, as a wandering show in Laguna Beach.

First Pageant of the Masters: 1933

How long at current site: 58 years

When current lease expires: September 2001.

Duration of show each year: two months. This year it runs from July 3 to September 3.

Annual visitors to the Pageant of the Masters: 150,000

Additional annual visitors to the Festival of Arts: 75,000

Number of volunteers for the Pageant of the Masters: 600

Number of exhibitors in the Festival of Arts: 160

Sales within city generated by festival: about $6 million.