THE PLAY’S THE THING FOR NEW LEADER IN PASADENA
Danny Feldman is full of enthusiasm — and ideas — for reviving the flagging Pasadena institution.
Danny Feldman pauses for a moment, soaking in the view while taking his beagle Hunter for his morning walk along El Molino Avenue in Pasadena. “Look at all the people — young people, couples, families — so much energy,” he says. “I’m so excited. There’s a Trejo’s Cantina going in here. Margaritas and guacamole before theater! And after theater too!”
Feldman isn’t the president of Pasadena’s Chamber of Commerce, but he may well be the community’s biggest booster. The new leader of the Pasadena Playhouse has returned to his native Southern California after a seven-year stint in New York.
“This was a theater I came to as a kid,” he says. “I believe this is one of the most beautiful theaters in the world.”
The Pasadena Playhouse, which holds the designation of the State Theater of California, marks its centennial this summer. And while that’s reason to celebrate, the theater continues to struggle for survival amid financial challenges. Eight months into the job, Feldman has his work cut out for him.
Back at the office, Hunter settles into his dog bed under Feldman’s tidy desk, which is covered with assorted papers, two editions of the play “Our Town,” a book about the history of the Pasadena Playhouse and an orchid that looks like it would benefit from a little water. Behind what Feldman calls “the world’s most uncomfortable sofa” are striking posters of upcoming shows, minimalist in design but bursting with color. On the opposite wall are four small panels that display the evolution of the new Playhouse logo, which, like the posters, were custom created by Paula Scher of the famed design firm Pentagram as part of the theater’s recent rebrand.
Feldman has been camped out in a temporary office at the Playhouse since he arrived in October, transitioning into the role of producing artistic director as Sheldon Epps ends his 20-year tenure. Feldman’s position is new, combining the artistic job with the businessside role of executive director. .
“To me, the season was really tied to the 100th anniversary of the Playhouse. It’s a defining moment in the theater’s history. Where I draw most of my inspiration is bridging the past and future,” he says, running down the list with the enthusiasm of a kid on show-andtell day at school.
His inaugural season consists of “Our Town,” a co-production with Deaf West Theatre; an immersive production “Pirates of Penzance”; the Southern California premiere of Mike Bartlett’s play “King Charles III”; an updated version of Culture Clash’s 1998 play “Bordertown”; and one to-be-announced show.
Theater, Feldman will tell you, is in his DNA.
“I love still to this day sitting in the theater with the lights going down and the feeling that this might be the best thing I’m ever about to see,” he says.
His parents instilled a passion for theater. The walls of his bedroom in West Hills were lined with posters of shows he saw with his family. “My very first one was ‘Fiddler on the Roof ’ at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. It shaped me,” says Feldman, 37. “The second show was ‘Phantom of the Opera’ at the Ahmanson. I saw that so many times. I wanted to be like Hal Prince.”
Feldman went on to study music at UCLA, where he served as music director in a number of student productions, including “Once Upon a Mattress,” staged by Bruin alum Carol Burnett.
“I wanted to be a music director, but my theater professor in the music department basically said to me, ‘You’re too bossy,’ because I would sit in the pit and look up and be like …” Feldman scrunches his face and rolls his eyes. “He said, ‘You should be a producer.’ ”
So the sophomore dipped his toes into professional theater, producing the pop opera “bare” at the Hudson Theatre in Hollywood. The musical became a cult hit. He went on to form a production company that would produce the L.A. premiere of “Corpus Christi,” Terrence McNally’s gay Passion play, and other shows in small theaters.
Upon graduation, he took a job with the now-defunct Reprise theater company, working his way up to general manager. “I loved that job. I loved doing classical musicals,” Feldman says.
But New York beckoned. After eight years with Reprise, Feldman cold-applied to the Labyrinth Theater Company in New York, whose roster has included Ethan Hawke, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Lynn Nottage and the late Philip Seymour Hoffman. As the company’s first executive director, he oversaw financials, fundraising, grant writing and community outreach.
“It was love at first interview,” says outgoing Labyrinth artistic director Mimi O’Donnell. “We were a team.”
Feldman immersed himself in all aspects of the company, getting to know playwrights and learning all he could about play development. “Artists love him. They could talk to him,” O’Donnell says. “He wasn’t just the executive director who just dealt with numbers; they could have a conversation.”
The challenge Feldman faces now is familiar to nonprofits across the country: building new audiences when donations and grants are scarce. But Pasadena Playhouse’s struggle has been particularly high profile, its deep roots making it not only the beneficiary of community good will but also the subject of swirling rumor.
In 2010, the Playhouse was on the brink of closure, laying off nearly all its staff, canceling the remainder of its season and eventually filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. About three months later, it emerged from bankruptcy, thanks in large part to a $1-million matching gift from Mike Stoller, half of the songwriting team Leiber & Stoller, and his wife, Corky Hale Stoller.
Nearly a decade later, things remain shaky, according to sources with knowledge of finances at the Playhouse, whose 2016-17 budget is more than $7 million. As recently as last year, board members had to provide loans to help with cash flow, sources say.
Two large-cast productions from Epps’ final season, David Henry Hwang’s “M. Butterfly” and Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night,” were pulled from the schedule and replaced with the three-hander “The Originalist,” about the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and the one-man show “Hold These Truths,” about Japanese American civil rights activist Gordon Hirabayashi.
“Cost was a factor, just like it is a factor in every show. But I think it is incorrect to say it was all financial or it was a change in artistic directors,” Feldman says. “It was a variety of reasons. We saw a real opportunity to do two plays about what is going on in America right now. It just felt right to do.”
The Playhouse faced a firestorm of criticism when it presented “God Looked Away,” starring Al Pacino and Judith Light. Dotson Rader’s play was billed as the first of the Playhouse’s PlayWorks Development productions, meaning it was a work in progress. But with top ticket prices of $250 and some patrons unaware they were paying for an unfinished play, complaints rolled in. Times critic Charles McNulty called the production “exploitative drivel.”
“The decision to do that show was not financially motivated,” Feldman says. “The decision to do that show was about establishing a program here to develop new work as this theater has been doing for 100 years.”
PlayWorks, he says, is part of his broader mission to educate the community and to bring theater training back to the Playhouse, whose alumni include Gene Hackman and Dustin Hoffman. “There were also people who felt very happy with their experience and would have paid more for that experience,” he says. “Is ‘Hamilton’ worth $1,000 or whatever? There are people who pay that and have no regrets.”
The theater offered $25 and $60 tickets in the orchestra section at every performance, he says. “We are trying to break through the idea that for younger people or people with lower income, the theater is not for them,” he says. “My job is to make sure we are accessible to a wide swath of people.”
Finally, he says, “The Playhouse is in the black. This season has a surplus budget. It’s certainly true our development production of ‘God Looked Away’ gave us a boost. But it did not save this organization; that is not what’s paying for next season.”
Board Chairman Brad King has confidence that Feldman can turn things around.
“While we had been struggling financially and Danny came into a very difficult financial situation, we worked incredibly hard at resetting the position — hitting the reset button,” he says.
Feldman has launched postshow talkbacks — not with the casts but with people billed as experts to the topics in the productions. He started rebranding the theater, a process that includes its logo and website. He is exploring ties to L.A.’s 99-seat theaters.
Feldman has a new subscription model, similar to museum memberships. Instead of buying a season subscription, patrons become yearlong “members” with priority access to tickets, choice in when they attend shows and invitations to events and talks. “We are in a self-curating society,” he says. “The metaphor I use is iTunes and the idea that once people were able to buy the song versus the album, that was really a big change.”
O’Donnell acknowledges there will be a learning curve for Feldman, but “as long as his board and the community of Pasadena and the L.A. theater community embrace him, I’m telling you, there’s nothing that is going to stop that guy,” she says. “He’s going to turn that organization around. He’s not going to sleep until he does.” calendar@latimes.com