The sudden popularity of The Interim Game
It wasn’t a big surprise, but the news was finally announced officially a few days ago. After more than 22 years at the helm, Charles Cutts will retire this summer as president and CEO of the Corporation of Massey Hall and Roy Thomson Hall. That means we can add one more big name to the list of arts leaders taking flight in what has become a flurry of change at the top level of the culture world.
Given the fact that before taking his current job Cutts had a long run in control of what was then the O’Keefe Centre (now Sony Centre), he can lay claim to being one of the longest-lasting heavy hitters in the field of big-budget arts organizations. But now he appears to be part of a mass exodus.
Let’s quickly rewind the tape. Within the next few months, Janet Carding is leaving her post after five years as CEO of the Royal Ontario Museum. Janice Price is leaving Luminato after presiding over the first eight editions of the annual arts festival — and moving to Alberta as the next CEO of the Banff Centre. And last summer, Bill Boyle left Harbourfront Centre and was replaced by a new CEO from Australia, Marah Braye.
Upshot: Business is booming for head-hunters. The Shaw Festival is in search mode for not one but two major players, replacing departing executive director Elaine Calder and departing artistic director Jackie Maxwell.
But the most striking new phenomenon is the sudden popularity of The Interim Game (not to be confused with that movie, The Imitation Game, about cracking Nazi codes).
The Interim Game is not about cracking codes. The object of the game is to find placeholders who can warm the seats of departing CEO until there is time to secure suitable long-term replacements.
The Sony Centre has been in interim mode since last summer, when Dan Brambilla retired as CEO, and his longtime program director, Mark Hammond, agreed to step in on a temporary basis — which is likely to last longer than anyone anticipated. That’s because nothing can be done until the post-Ford gang at city hall figure out what they want to do with the glitziest of the three theatres under their control.
The Banff Centre has been operating under interim CEO Jack Davis ever since Jeff Melanson left in mid-2014 (and was soon hired by the TSO).
The country’s newest national museum, the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, has had Gail Stephens as its interim CEO ever since Stuart Murray, who got the place open in September, was told by the federal government just a month later that his contract was not being renewed.
Next, we can expect that Luminato will name an interim CEO, even while it chooses a search firm to find a permanent successor to Price. Those are two big decisions facing Tony Gagliano, who is not only the festival’s co-founder but continues to reign as chair of its board.
The ROM, too, will need an interim CEO to bridge the gap between Carding’s exit in March and the anointment of her successor.
In the case of Cutts, his impending departure, set for Aug. 31, has been in the works for so long that this may be a rare case in which a major arts organization can have a new CEO chosen and on the scene before the previous one leaves the building.
Under his watch, Roy Thomson Hall underwent a $24-million acoustic enhancement, and became not just the place where you could hear the Toronto Symphony Orchestra but also a prime venue for a smorgasbord of events that went beyond the fringe of classical music. The more activity there was in the building, the busier the underground parking garage — which has given RTH a Midas touch.
In his final phase, Cutts has set in place a hugely ambitious plan to reinvent Massey Hall. But he’ll let his successor take care of getting the job done.
That’s just one of the challenges the new boss will face in the post-Cutts era. Will regime change create an opportunity for a new relationship to be forged between Thomson Hall and the deficit-plagued Toronto Symphony Orchestra?
Will the non-TSO programming at RTH put more emphasis on taking creative chances and less on booking safe attractions that involve no financial risk?
And will the transformation of Massey Hall, scheduled to take years, proceed as planned, giving the crumbling Shuter St. shrine a whole new life? The answers to some of these questions will very much depend on who is chosen to replace Charles Cutts. mknelman@thestar.ca