Post-Shubert, Will Big Shows Find a Home?

News of plans to raze the Shubert Theatre in Century City provoked a round of speculation about where the shows that play the Shubert might go, after the 2,100-seat theater closes at the end of September 2002.

Whether the New York-based Shubert Organization will continue to present shows in L.A. is hard to tell. The company is making no commitments--or even comment--although Shubert officials are listening to overtures from the operators of several other venues.

One of those overtures was on behalf of the Orpheum Theatre, a 1926 vaudeville and movie palace at 842 S. Broadway, with seating of 2,056. Steve Needleman spent $3 million earlier this year refurbishing his family’s theater. The renovation tripled the number of women’s restroom stalls (to 32) and added wheelchair seating. More than 1,500 parking spaces are located within a block of the theater, Needleman said.

The Orpheum and the other old downtown movie and vaudeville palaces have a champion in the preservationist group Los Angeles Conservancy. Its officials contacted the Shubert Organization last week to make sure that L.A.’s historic downtown theaters are under consideration for future use. The conservancy’s Broadway Initiative coordinator Amy Anderson said Shubert Chairman Gerald Schoenfeld expressed the most interest in the Orpheum, which would require the least renovation. Shubert officials declined comment.

Needleman admits that the Orpheum couldn’t accommodate the biggest musicals, like “The Lion King” or “The Phantom of the Opera,” because the stage is only 30 feet deep. By contrast, the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, which is home to “The Lion King,” has 40 feet of depth in which scenery can be hung, plus an alcove of nearly 30 feet for scenery changes and storage.

Special events at the Orpheum have done well, including the Conservancy’s “Last Remaining Seats” film screenings, but no one has tried a typical commercial theater schedule--eight shows a week for at least several weeks.

With a stage depth of only 26 feet, the 1,350-to-1,900-seat Wilshire Theatre in Beverly Hills can’t accommodate the biggest musicals either. The theater is already used much more frequently now than in recent years, because of the presence of “The Lion King” at the Pantages, which has pushed most of the Nederlander Organization’s Broadway/L.A. subscription series out of its usual home. The Wilshire will soon present local premieres of the nonmusical Tony-winners “Copenhagen” and “Proof” and would be available to pick up some shows that might otherwise have gone to the Shubert, said its manager, Martin Wiviott.

The 2,700-seat Pantages is booked into 2002 with “The Lion King” but eventually will be available, especially for the bigger shows that might stay for more than six or eight weeks.

The new Kodak Theatre, opening in November at Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue, has a flexible seating capacity between 2,700 and 3,500. Anschutz Entertainment Group, which operates the theater, wants to present one or two major theatrical runs each year, each between six and eight weeks, said Brenda Tinnen, Anschutz’s senior vice president. “The Full Monty” is booked for next spring. “Our schedule at this point is fairly fluid,” Tinnen said.

The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce has floated the idea of returning the 2,350-seat Hollywood Pacific Theater, now a shuttered three-plex movie theater, to its “legit” roots, which date from 1926. Located on Hollywood Boulevard in between the Pantages and the Kodak, the restoration could turn Hollywood Boulevard into a chain of three big “legit” houses, supplemented by the nearby 1,000-seat Doolittle Theatre. But Jay Swerdlow, executive vice president of Pacific Theatres, which owns the theater, said the theater “needs major work in practically every area except for the structure itself.”

Martin Markinson, operator of the Wadsworth Theater, said he’s looking for more Broadway-style bookings, but the Brentwood theater’s capacity of 1,400 is a drawback for many tour producers. Of the Shubert’s current four-show season, Markinson said, the Wadsworth could have worked for “Dame Edna: The Royal Tour,” but he doubts the producers of the other three, larger shows would have wanted to limit their potential revenues with a Wadsworth booking.

It’s possible that the fall of the 2,100-seat Shubert will reduce the ability of a huge hit to linger in L.A. for longer than, say, eight weeks. Although downtown’s Ahmanson Theatre presented “The Phantom of the Opera” for more than four years from 1989 to 1993, its runs are now limited by the necessity to program five shows a year for subscribers. The Kodak wants to book a variety of programming, including the Academy Awards and other awards shows and concerts, preventing long theatrical runs.

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The number of candidates for extremely long runs has diminished since the heyday of producers Cameron Mackintosh (“Evita,” “Les Miserables”) and Garth Drabinsky (“Ragtime”) and composer Andrew Lloyd Webber (“Evita,” “Sunset Boulevard”).

Two local producers who know the Shubert Organization well are skeptical that it will remain active in L.A.--at least to the extent of maintaining a home base in a large L.A. theater.

“If you look at the trend over the last 20 years, they’ve been re-centralizing their operations in New York,” said Lawrence O’Connor, who worked for Shubert from 1986 to 1999; during his last eight years with the company, he managed the Century City Shubert. Since 1986, Shubert has sold two theaters in Chicago and leased one to a long-term operator in Boston. “It’s a longshot for them to return. That being said, I hope they do. They’re a class organization.”

Gordon Davidson, artistic director of Center Theatre Group’s Ahmanson Theatre and Mark Taper Forum, said Shubert “has to take a good, hard look at L.A. Should they be players, in principle? Yes, because they’re a major force in the American theater. But how many large theaters does this town need? There is an incredibly delicate ratio between capacity and demand.”

Most Broadway tours, which wouldn’t consider L.A. runs of more than six weeks, will probably find homes in the existing L.A. theaters. Even with its shorter runs, L.A. is still one of America’s biggest markets for touring shows.

The first big test as to whether the remaining L.A. theaters can fill all the needs of the L.A. commercial theater market may be “The Producers.” Although casting will be critical, “The Producers” is probably the first big show since “The Lion King” that is capable of staying for an extended period of time in L.A.

Will the show be able to find a berth for such a long run in L.A., or will it be limited by the continuation of “The Lion King” at the Pantages and by the restrictions of the schedules at the Ahmanson and the Kodak?

John Barlow, a spokesman for the producers of “The Producers,” said decisions on tour dates, an L.A. venue and the timing or length of an L.A. run have not been reached. However, don’t expect “The Producers” to usher out the Shubert in a blaze of glory--Barlow said the theater will close before “The Producers” can come to L.A.