The pay’s the thing

The internationally renowned American Shakespeare Center in Staunton is hardly alone among theaters facing a dramatic financial situation stemming from the current economic recession.

But if a California theater is any example, a lot of money can be raised in a short time to keep what many there have seen as a valuable community contributor.

Shakespeare Santa Cruz, which has not been profitable for several years, learned in December it would no longer receive money from the University of California at Santa Cruz’s arts division, which had been absorbing the theater’s deficits.

It had eight days to raise $300,000 or face closure in 2009. The theater raised $416,417 from more than 2,050 individual donors, allowing it to stay open with a reduced budget of $1.49 million, down from $2 million in 2008. The theater had projected a $500,000 loss last year.

“Santa Cruz did their campaign, and that was a big wake-up call for us,” said David Dreyfoos, managing director at ASC, which just started its own cash appeal. “If we don’t go public with this, we’ll be way behind.”

Other theaters in the U.S. also face money troubles. In Beverly, Mass., the North Shore Music Theatre needs to raise $500,000 to stay open until late spring, and another $4 million to open next season.

For the Baltimore Opera Company, the situation is worse. It filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and canceled shows through May, though it says that, following an administrative reorganization, it intends to return to producing grand opera.

Donna Law, vice president of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America and the managing director of the Orlando Shakespeare Theater, said theater and arts programs across the U.S. are feeling the crunch with declining income from sponsors, donors and foundations.

“There are dozens that I personally know of, and I suspect that there are dozens and dozens of others that are trying to anticipate what the future is to hold,” Law said.

The Orlando Shakespeare Theater, she said, has made budget adjustments and reallocated resources.

“We’re very much aware of the fact that our patrons that are living on fixed incomes have less discretionary income,” Law said.

ASC, home to the world’s sole re-creation of Shakespeare’s indoor theater with the 300-seat Blackfriars Playhouse that opened in September 2001, says it needs to raise $250,000 by the end of January, and has until May to raise another $400,000.

Dan Layman, chairman of the group’s board of trustees, e-mailed supporters last Tuesday, warning of the theater’s “grave” need in order to hold onto key programs and preserve the theater’s future.

Having cut $250,000 from its budget, including six full-time positions, ASC has depleted cash reserves, and is left with about $2.9 million in its current budget and 11 to 12 full-time employees, not including actors.

“We’re a very small staff anyway, and this really brought us down to a skeleton crew,” Dreyfoos said.

None of ASC’s money comes from the city of Staunton, though in June 2008 it received a $112,500 grant from the Virginia Commission for the Arts. The theater received about 90 percent of that money prior to state budget cuts in October, but its last check will be 82 percent less than what the group was expecting, Dreyfoos said. The arts commission lost 15 percent of its overall budget during state budget cuts.

ASC is hoping for a boost in ticket sales during a generally slow winter season with the opening of its Actors Renaissance Season. Ticket sales in December were up 15 percent over the same time last year, but Deirdre Sullivan, ASC’s director of development, said she hopes the current campaign will not be a deterrent to potential theatergoers. The group generates 60 percent of its income from ticket sales and another 40 percent from contributions. The theater has slightly fewer than 900 donors, the small number coming from a lack of a broad donor base, Sullivan said.

“In order to reach our goal of $650,000, we need a lot more than 900 people to contribute to our campaign,” Sullivan said.

Layman’s e-mail said the theater’s immediate future would be threatened without the cash infusion. Theater officials say the economy has taken its toll on schools bringing students to the theater and on finding performance locations for its traveling troupe.

January is typically a hard month for ASC, but Dreyfoos said it is worse now because the traveling troupe lost an entire week’s worth of bookings with one university cancellation. Other universities have canceled ASC troupe visits in February and March.

The nonprofit Americans for the Arts in Washington, D.C., estimated ASC’s economic impact to Staunton and the Augusta County region at nearly $4.6 million in fiscal year 2007. During that time, the theater sold 54,138 tickets, with approximately 25,000 people from across the U.S. and abroad visiting Staunton.

Through the first four days of ASC’s fundraising campaign, it has raised about $25,000, mostly from current donors giving anywhere from $5 to $1,000. Before September, the theater received about three online donations yearly. By Friday morning, Sullivan said it had received 20, with more coming in throughout the day. Donors can go to the theater’s Web site, donate through the Facebook Causes program or send a check to the theater.

With Dreyfoos adamant about not closing the doors to the theater, he said ASC is having to look at its entire organization and core values, and said it will continue to be “smart and cautious” in future business plans. Sullivan said without enough donations, its Young Company Theatre Camp (ages 9-12) and its Midsummer Day Camp (ages 13-18) are in danger, as the theater has yet to commit to them for the upcoming summer.

“It’s someplace we don’t want to cut because it’s so important for those young people,” Sullivan said.

She said the theater had contemplated programming cuts in January, but said “it didn’t make sense” upon closer study.

Law said theaters like the one in Santa Cruz, which staved off closing, and in Staunton, will have to continue making adjustments. She believes, however, that arts programs can, in the phrasing of ASC’s current campaign, “survive and thrive.”

“It’s just a little harder for us because so much of what we do is based on contributed income,” Law said. “And that’s the donations, that’s the discretionary income. People have less income, or think they do. It’s going to be tough for a while, but arts are always going to be a part of our lives.”