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Though Miami-Dade's Board of County Commissioners on July 18 earmarked $150,000 for the Playhouse to hire management consultants to lead it out of its current crisis, it will be months before the theater can begin to recover. Board Chair Shelly Spivack told commissioners she hopes the Playhouse can present a ''mini-season'' by February. ''We have to do something,'' she says. But before they can raise the curtain on another season at the Playhouse, Spivack and the board must overcome daunting obstacles: • The unions representing actors, directors and other theater professionals will not work with the Playhouse or Arnold Mittelman, its former producing artistic director, because of unpaid expenses and benefits. No show using union actors, directors, choreographers, stage managers and technicians can be staged until the debt is paid and the bans lifted. ''If the Coconut Grove clears the debt, Arnold, as an individual, also comes off the default list,'' says Maria Somma, a spokeswoman for Actors' Equity Association, the professional actors' and stage managers' union. The Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers (SSDC) also has put the Playhouse on its default list due to unpaid expenses, and the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees has sued the theater for reneging on more than $75,000 in guaranteed benefits. • Patrons who spent hundreds or even thousands of dollars to subscribe to a now-defunct 2006-2007 season want a refund, or at least the courtesy of a response from the Playhouse. The theater's phones have been disconnected and patrons complain they are being ignored. ''They have my money and my feeling is they've actually stolen $700 from me, and I want it back,'' says Len Northrup of Hollywood, a Playhouse subscriber since 1996. • Staff members who kept the theater running as debt mounted -- even to the point of using their own credit cards and cash to pay daily expenses -- were fired in May and are still owed $86,000 in vacation and severance pay, and another $23,000 in expense reimbursements, according to people familiar with the situation. ''No one has heard a word from anyone on the board,'' says former company manager Terri Schermer, who charged $8,405.45 to her personal credit card on behalf of the theater but has yet to be reimbursed. • The Florida Department of State is demanding repayment of a $125,000 grant, plus interest, that Mittelman misused in March to cover the theater's payroll, including his own salary. The grant was restricted for building improvements only. Susan Smith, a spokeswoman for the state, says officials are reviewing an offer from the Playhouse to repay the grant by Dec. 31, 2007, while paying interest on the balance beginning in January. • There is still no explanation of how the nonprofit theater amassed a $4 million debt or why the board of directors did not act sooner to reverse the financial crisis. Those issues must be clarified if the Playhouse is to regain the confidence of future audiences and potential donors. ''We need to get to a point where people will trust the institution,'' Spivack says. • Even if the Playhouse recovers from its debt, the board still must develop a plan to restore the 80-year-old theater building, which has long been in disrepair. Past efforts to sell the property and build a new facility have been stymied by a historic designation that strictly limits changes to the structure. • Though the theater continues to receive significant public funding, the board refuses to operate in a transparent manner. The Miami Herald filed a lawsuit against the Playhouse in May, seeking access to the theater's financial and other records. The suit awaits hearing in trial court. CLINGING TO HOPE Despite such obstacles, Playhouse leaders cling to the hope that they can salvage the theater that presented the American debut of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot in 1956. In May the board retained the law firm of Berger Singerman to negotiate with creditors, and in July it hired an accounting firm, Morrison Brown Argiz & Farra, to perform a forensic audit of the theater's financial records. The last piece of the recovery team is the management consultant, AMS Planning & Research of Connecticut, whose services will cost $250,000, says Spivack. She plans to ask Miami-Dade commissioners for another grant to cover that cost. Any recovery effort will have to include a major fundraising campaign to pay down the Playhouse's debt and establish a financial foundation -- a difficult task made harder by the attention that potential donors are giving the soon-to-open Carnival Center for the Performing Arts. Over the summer Spivack met with county officials and other civic leaders to try to shore up financial and political support. Miami-Dade Commissioner Sally Heyman says she supported the Playhouse's recent funding request because the theater is an important ingredient in the county's cultural mix. ''The Coconut Grove Playhouse is an institution,'' she says. ``I think it deserves to have some funds to vet it out and to see what direction it takes from there.'' The theater remains eligible for $20 million from the county to restore the building, but the board must demonstrate financial stability before it can receive a nickel, says Michael Spring, director of the county's cultural affairs division. BEHIND THE SCENES So far, the recovery effort has been largely behind the scenes and sometimes contentious. Over the summer the Playhouse board weathered the resignations of several members and an apparent power struggle to force Spivack from her post. Former vice chair Lynn Martenstein, who had been appointed the board's spokesperson early in the crisis, resigned from the board ''a couple of months ago,'' she said this past week. ``There were a number of resignations. I'm aware of like three or four.'' Asked why she resigned, Martenstein demurred. ''I still have to make my living in PR,'' said Martenstein, who is vice president of corporate communications for Royal Caribbean Cruises. She said she could not recall the names of the other board members who resigned. Spivack confirmed the board departures but said she could not remember details. ''Lynn has resigned. A couple of members of the board of trustees have resigned,'' she said. ``I'm trying to remember who else has resigned. Some people who weren't really active have resigned.'' About 25 to 30 people remain on the Playhouse board, Spivack said. The group is scheduled to elect officers in September. Spivack, whose term as chair runs through 2007, won a vote of confidence this summer after board member Robert Ruwitch called for her resignation over the summer. Ruwitch, who remains on the board, says he and a group of other board members disagreed with Spivack's leadership, which advocated patience -- and silence -- while a recovery team was assembled. ''I understand trying to get your hands around the debt and all the pieces,'' he says. ``But I think you really need to . . . access the philanthropic community.'' Before the Playhouse can begin fundraising, Spivack says it needs a detailed vision for the future. ''In order to make a plea for donations, we have to have a plan in place,'' she says. ``People aren't going to contribute to stale debt. They're going to contribute to the future.'' The Playhouse's immediate past, though, remains messy and unresolved. Leonard Foglia is one of the directors whose situation led to the SSDC censure. He staged Southern Comforts with Hal Holbrook and Dixie Carter at the Playhouse last season. From start to finish and beyond, he says, his experience in South Florida was ``abominable, insulting and very unprofessional.'' After the theater failed to pay his bill at the Marriott Residence Inn on Tigertail Avenue in Coconut Grove, he said, his credit card, which he provided for incidentals, was charged $3,200 for his stay -- an amount his union hasn't been able to get the theater to pay. ''Having to pay for my presence there was the final insult,'' Foglia says. ``Every single day down there was surreal. I just want them to pay their bills. Then the unions will have a lot more sympathy for their situation.'' SUBSCRIBERS IRATE One group losing patience with the Playhouse is its 2006-2007 season subscribers, who want a season or a refund. Michael Levine works at Miami-Dade Schools headquarters in its facilities planning department and lives in Davie. He has routinely bought four season tickets -- a $1,600 investment for this new season -- for 20 years. He has heard nothing from the theater and has been unable to reach anyone. ''All we read was the negative press; that's the last taste all of us have of the theater,'' he says. Miami Beach resident Murray Norkin and his family are out even more money. Norkin bought four seats and gave a donation for a total of $2,500; his daughter spent $1,000 on two seats and a donation. ''The closing wasn't surprising,'' he said. ``The theater is obsolete. It doesn't have enough stage area and backstage area. And all the one- and two-person shows were disappointing. The crowds were nothing last year. But when they called and said please send your money, we did.'' He, like the other subscribers, is angry at the lack of communication from the theater. ''They are snubbing the public that has put their faith into the people who run the organization,'' he said. ``If you can't repay, you should at least reply.'' Ensuring that South Florida's oldest professional theater remains part of the region's cultural future is further complicated by the status of the man who charted its artistic course over the past 21 years: Arnold Mittelman. The board believes he has stepped down, but the wording of his resignation leaves open the possibility that his relationship with the Playhouse is not over. Mittelman resigned May 16 with a terse e-mail that read, in part, ``continued wrongful breach of my employment agreement has forced me this day to vacate my position.'' He will not speak for the record. He is, however, trying to move on as a producer. In an e-mail to the Herald Aug. 17, Mittelman wrote: ``While I do not wish to comment on any specifics regarding the Coconut Grove Playhouse, suffice it to say that I remain extraordinarily proud of my 21-year association with that wonderful theater and firmly committed to its future. I am currently exploring all opportunities to provide great theater to the audiences of South Florida. I am also examining various other options that represent both national and regional positions and projects in not-for-profit and commercial settings.'' Stars who have worked at the Playhouse through the years -- a roster that includes some of the biggest names in theater -- bemoan its potential loss. Theodore Bikel first worked at the Playhouse in Neil Simon's The Sunshine Boys during the 1973-74 season. He has returned many times, most recently last season opposite Patricia Conolly in About Time at the Playhouse and the Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale. ''I saw a theater that was beset by problems that weren't of its making,'' Bikel says. ``It got in debt heavily, even though there was a board that could have done something. They let it fester, then they picked a fall guy [Mittelman].'' In Bikel's view, the blame lies with the board -- but he says that shouldn't be the end of the story. ''You have to be passionate about theater. No one can sit on a board like this with a bean-counter's mentality. You can't do art that way,'' he said. ``This is a jewel sitting in the middle of Coconut Grove. It can't be left fallow.'' Copyright 2006 Miami Herald Media Co. Link (Very long URL)
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