In a move certain to shock Los Angeles theatergoers, the Center Theatre Group (CTG) announced Thursday that it is canceling plans for a 2023-24 season at the Mark Taper Forum, one of the most important homes for new plays in the city, if not the country, due to severe financial concerns.
The organization’s two other theaters, the Ahmanson and Kirk Douglas Theatres, will continue with their seasons as usual, with 2023-24 programs to be announced shortly, the announcement said.
The programming suspension at the 736-seat Mark Taper will begin after a current world premiere musical, “Transparent,” wraps up its run on June 25. Two other shows that had already been announced will have their runs canceled or postponed. The world premiere of “Fake It Until You Make It,” set to begin Aug. 2, is being called off, although the org said “we plan to feature it) in a future season.” Meanwhile, a touring production of “Cambodian Rock Band” set for the Mark Taper has been canceled outright.
Although the announcement did not include any specific news about staffing cuts, the Los Angeles Times reported shortly before the press release went out that CTG will be cutting about 10% of its full-time staff as a result of the funding crisis. CTG’s managing director and CEO, Meghan Pressman, told the Times that the organization’s budget deficit is in the millions of dollars.
The release noted that CTG “continues to feel the aftereffects of the pandemic and has been struggling to balance ever-increasing production costs with significantly reduced ticket revenue and donations that remain behind 2019 levels. We are still facing a crisis unlike any other in our 56-year history. It is in this environment that we have to take the extraordinary step of pausing a significant portion of CTG programming beginning this summer and continuing through the 2023/24 Season, as well as taking significant restructuring measures to build a vibrant and sustainable organization that can navigate this new paradigm.”
The CTG said that the venue will not be completely dark during the next year, as it is looking at “innovative, non-traditional” and “community-centered” events to put on in the theater while normal programming is suspended.
The most successful play to be produced since the theater returned after the pandemic was the acclaimed “Slave Play,” which sold out its entire run. Other productions have not been so fortunate, although the Mark Taper had continued to act as a launching place for shows that go on to New York, like last year’s “King James,” which is now wrapping up a run at the Manhattan Theatre Club.
Elaborating on the problems that are facing most theaters in the country, Pressman told the Times, “With this announcement, we are saying, in part, ‘theater is not back,’ and the No. 1 thing people can do is go to their local theater. If we’re going to really come back we need people to act faster than they have been to show that they care about live performing arts.”
