Grove’s money dispute continues

For a small-stage troupe, the $200,000-a-year Grove Theater Center has covered lots of ground in the last few years, running theaters in Garden Grove and Burbank and mounting an outdoor summer season in Fullerton.

But the plug has been pulled on the Grove’s Fullerton shows in a dispute with its host, the Muckenthaler Cultural Center, over unpaid rent. Instead of collaborating on the boards, the two arts organizations are grappling in court over $16,000.

The Grove was hoping to proceed this summer with the fifth of six contracted seasons at the Muckenthaler, transferring three or four shows from its main stage in Garden Grove to the 246-seat outdoor amphitheater at the historic mansion.

Charles Johanson, the Grove’s executive director, says the contract allows his troupe to keep producing there as long as it pays interest on any rent it owes. But the Muckenthaler sued for the full amount in February, Johanson says, and in May told the Grove it was canceling the two remaining contracted seasons.

The average theater evening at the Muckenthaler has drawn just 50 to 75 people, Johanson says. John Kelly, the museum’s attorney -- who also serves on its board -- says the plan is to put together a new theater program for next year rather than rush to find a producer for this season. One possibility would involve forging ties with local high school and college theater departments.

The Grove, for its part, is trying to blossom from the sketchily funded, grass-roots professional operation that Johanson and artistic director Kevin Cochran have struggled to keep going since 1994 into a more secure nonprofit. Its long-range aspiration is to stand alongside the larger South Coast Repertory and Laguna Playhouse as Orange County’s third major regional theater. While losing the Muckenthaler revenue stream won’t help, Johanson says, the Grove will be relieved of having to program “more commercial” outdoor summer fare and can now define a more adventurous artistic niche at the 172-seat Gem Theater in Garden Grove and the 98-seat GTC Burbank.

-- Mike Boehm