12-22-06
Large Theatre, Small Film in 2006
Neil Friedman, Herbert Perry and Hollis Resnik in Court’s Man of La Mancha.
A look at the stories PerformInk reported
If one needed to find a trend in the theatre and film news PerformInk reported this year, it would be that Chicago theatre seems to have ramped up the quality of its output – even when its practitioners leave the city – while film took an unexpected dip, leaving actors artistically satisfied, but financially hungry.
The first film news to hit the city was the escape to Texas of the Fox series, “Prison Break.” The show gave virtually every male actor in town a job in 2005, but once the characters broke out of prison, they didn’t need the Joliet Correctional Facility anymore. It didn’t hurt that “Prison Break” producer Garry Brown lives in Texas. And it was a coup for Texas Film Commissioner Bob Hudgins, former Illinois Film Office deputy director, who left the IFO after feeling marginalized.
But that was OK, said the Chicago film community, because Gov. Blagojevich had already announced that he wanted to raise the film tax credit to 20 percent of overall spending, up from the then-current 25 percent of wages only. The new law, proposed in March, but not passed until early May, also kept a provision for producers who don’t incur Illinois taxes to transfer their credits to outside investors. But it was limited to one year, making it hard to attract more television series.
Still, IFO and Chicago Film Office representatives were optimistic that once the incentive passed, films would flock back to Chicago. It didn’t happen. (See story, p. 5).
It didn’t happen in Wisconsin, either, where a generous tax credit was passed, to much fanfare, by the state legislature, and signed into law by Gov. Jim Doyle, in May. But an amendment tacked onto the bill at the last minute put the start date off by two years. Film Wisconsin, the industry group who pushed for the incentives, has been working hard since then, and they hope to have the start date made effective Jan. 1, 2007. We’ll report on that after the new year.
The numbers aren’t in on how the incentive affected commercial production. But ReelChicago.com reports that eight major accounts were lost by Chicago ad agencies in the last year: the U.S. Army, $1 billion; Dell Computers, $250 million; Cadillac, $225 million; Miller Lite, $180 million; Orbitz, $61 million; Whirlpool, $44 million; Kraft Foods condiments, $35 million; and Hillshire Farm, $20 million.
If commercials do come back, actors who appear in them will get a raise. SAG and AFTRA signed a commercials contract extension with advertisers that gives actors a 6 percent across the board raise. The agreement also gives the unions jurisdiction over new media – iPods, camera phones, eyeball extensions – in perpetuity. In return, advertisers get the ability to edit a commercial without having to pay the actors for a new spot. And both sides are commissioning a study on how actors should be paid in a world where a commercial does not have set parameters anymore.
Lots of rumors about agency movements circulated in 2006, but only two actually came to fruition. In February, Linda Jack took on Mickey Grossman as a partner, changing the name of their agency to Grossman & Jack Talent. Then in October, Sharon Wottrich sold Voices Unlimited to Innovative Artists Agency, a large, L.A.-based agency, with offices in many cities.
The most interesting film/television story of 2006 was Second City’s deal with NBC. The 2-year deal, signed just weeks before NBC announced massive layoffs, will focus on creating comedy programming for TV and digital media. Second City’s Kelly Leonard says that they are in the midst of opening their new media office in L.A., and will likely have an executive director hired after the first of the year.
“It’s basically all geared up to begin in January,” Leonard said.
On the theatre side, space seemed to be the big story of the year. Victory Gardens finally opened their new space at the Biograph, making more rentable space available at the newly named Victory Gardens Greenhouse.
Apple Tree moved to a temporary location at the Karger Center, which the city of Highland Park is giving them virtually rent free for two years. The theatre and the city are negotiating for a permanent space.
The 3 Arts Club decided to sell its building, scotching plans for a multi-arts facility, which would have included Timeline Theatre. The Chernin Center for the Arts at the Duncan YMCA announced it will close in 2007, and the space at 2851 N. Halsted, which was home to the St. Nicholas Theatre, Steppenwolf, Organic and ComedySportz, closed over the summer. ComedySportz landed on top of Ann Sathers restaurant, where they’re building a 147-seat space, set to open in the spring. Meanwhile, they’re performing in a number of venues, primarily at Chicago Center for the Performing Arts.
National Graphx (formerly National Photo) even joined the space brigade, moving its operations from downtown Chicago to Franklin Park. The move gives them more room for their digital machines.
The space story for Theatre Building Chicago is that it’s still standing. The fire that started on the morning of April 13 was quickly caught by technical director Thom Van Ermen. It destroyed the offices of the Illinois Theatre Alliance, and did some damage to the rest of the offices. When TBC staff started to rebuild, says executive director Joan Mazzonelli, they ran into more problems.
“We had a fire, then we discovered that we had to clean all the offices out so we could paint them and refurbish them,” said Mazzonelli. Lots of stuff was thrown away. But lots of stuff was found to be worth saving. “We have started a massive archiving project,” says Mazzonelli, adding, “We’re happy ‘cause the offices are really spiffy.”
No shows were canceled due to the fire.
And you can’t call it a year in theatre without at least one controversy involving Hedy Weiss. This time, Weiss was part of a scuffle with the Dramatists Guild, which pulled out every major playwright in the country to blast her for reviewing TBC’s Stages – workshops of new musicals. The Guild then tucked its tail between its legs when it learned that Weiss was invited, given a press packet and had reviewed Stages in the past – all without protest from TBC.
Protest was certainly on the mind of Jeanne Bishop early in 2006 when she learned of Doug Post’s play Somebody Foreign, and found out that it was set to run at City Lit. The show was inspired by the murder of Bishop’s sister, and the police trying to blame it on Bishop’s political activities. Bishop said the draft she was shown of the play paralleled the events in her life too closely, and Mike Miner pointed out in The Reader that it seemingly paralleled a story that The Reader ran about the murder in the early ‘90s. Bishop wanted the play canceled. Post had already signed a contract with City Lit, and Terry McCabe, City Lit’s artistic director, would not submit to pressure to cancel the production. He did, however, accept the resignation of his entire board, who felt the production – largely rewritten by Post to excise any similarities to Bishop’s life – was on morally shaky ground. Bishop had no legal grounds, but she made a lot of noise, even affecting funding for the production.
A lot of comings and goings in 2006, but there were some notable ones worth mentioning here. Jane Brody came back to town, after a 12-year absence. She is now teaching at DePaul. Deanna Shoss left the League of Chicago Theatres rather abruptly in June, before her first-year anniversary as executive director. And Wallace Smith stepped down from the Illinois Theatre Alliance after 30 years, a move hastened by the fire in his office, as mentioned above.
Jennifer Bielstein
Perhaps the most notable career move came from Jennifer Bielstein, who took a leap from Writers Theatre and caught the brass ring at Actors Theatre of Louisville. Bielstein had been executive director at Writers for three years, but couldn’t resist the possibility of replacing Louisville’s 40-year executive director, Alexander Speer.
“It’s certainly challenging to move to a new city and a new organization simultaneously,” said Bielstein, adding that she has settled in nicely and has jumped in to the Humana Fest, which begins in February. She finds in Louisville that “the arts are much more of a player in the business community and in the local government” than in Chicago.
Adrianne Cury certainly made a notable move this year – or she tried to, anyway. As she was riding her bike across the intersection of Austin and Adams in Oak Park on Aug. 1, on her way to her job in Oak Park Theatre Festival’s production of Picnic, she was struck by a car going pretty fast from her right. Cury suffered a compound fracture of her right tibia and fibula (the two bones between the knee and the ankle) and has had five surgeries thus far. She is still on crutches and hopes that the bones will regrow, so more surgery isn’t necessary. “Waiting for bone to regenerate is akin to waiting for paint to dry, plus a thousand,” said an e-mail that a friend sent to Cury.
Infamous Commonwealth Theatre got a big boost this year after winning four Jeff Citations in June. They took the Production-Play, Ensemble, Director-Play and Supporting Actor citations for The Kentucky Cycle. Infamous had never been nominated for a Jeff before.
Bailiwick Repertory had been nominated many times, and won eight more Citations – seven for Kiss of the Spider Woman and one for Angels in America, Parts 1 & 2, co-produced with The Hypocrites.
Court Theatre was the story for the Equity Jeff Awards, winning 10 awards for their productions of Fences and Man of La Mancha.
Chicago also had some success at the Tonys. Gary Griffin was not nominated for directing The Color Purple, but multiple Jeff winner Felicia Fields was nominated for her supporting role. Alas, she did not win, but the critics loved her.
2006 seemed to be the year for theatrical events. The ghost of Samuel Beckett turned 100, and theatres around the world celebrated, including Curious Theatre Branch, with a production of Waiting for Godot. Curious’ Rhino Fest this year was especially energetic, with two months’ worth of interesting productions and events.
YoYo Ma brought a fresh breeze to Chicago arts when he announced a year of the Silk Road Project. The Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, which is co-sponsoring the project with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the Art Institute of Chicago, gave theatres a chance to participate with a Silk Road Summer in Chicago project, that ran June 2 – Sept. 30. Ma even did an outdoor concert on the steps of the Art Institute.
The Goodman jumped on the festival bandwagon with their 7-week tribute to David Mamet, and their month-long Latino Theatre Festival.
Yet the event that seems to have captured everyone’s imaginations, oddly, is Suzan-Lori Parks’ 365 Days Project. Arts organizations around Chicago – indeed, around the country – will produce one of Parks’ plays each week till November of 2007. PerformInk is running a 365 schedule of Chicago productions each issue in our listings.
We’ve already got some great stories set for 2007. Remember, PerformInk doesn’t publish again till Jan. 19. But we will be updating audition notices online. Have a great Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, whatever else, and a happy and safe new year.
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Large Theatre, Small Film in 2006