IN THE NEWS

ON STAGE:
Blackman guides a transformed CLOSBC

BY JIM FARBER
RAVE!

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There’s always been one thing about Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities that is bigger than life -- its executive director, James Blackman.

Over 6 feet tall, well over 200 pounds, and with a motor mouth that can take off like a runaway train, Blackman, who recently turned 50, has long been the company's principal front man.

On stage, his ad-libbed pre-performance introductions are notorious for their quirky humor. Behind the scenes, he's proved himself a master showman, whether it involves sweet-talking potential donors, brow-beating recalcitrant civic leaders, or making sure the ailing palm trees in front of the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center are properly tended.

With messianic fervor he has transformed this little regional company into an artistic force with which to be reckoned.

It all started in April 1992, when Blackman and his co-founder, Artistic Director Irv Kimber, presented their first show, Mame.

Since then, CLOSBC has taken on the Herculean task of producing an impressive array of Broadway's greatest hits, including classics such as Oklahoma!, The Sound of Music, A Chorus Line, Evita, Ragtime and Dreamgirls, featuring the highest caliber of stage and music directors, choreographers, performers and designers.

The company’s high points have included critical acclaim and Ovation Awards for shows such as West Side Story and Crazy for You, and the 1998 decision to expand production by adding The Hermosa Beach Playhouse as a second venue, where Late Nite Catechism shows every indication of playing forever.

The lowest point began in 1998 with the acrimonious departure of Kimber. Then there was the economic fallout from 9-11 which, Blackman said, caused ticket sales to plummet.

"We were financially in really good shape up to 2001. We'd gotten rid of our old deficit, which was upwards of $3 million," Blackman explained. "Then 9-11, coupled with the fact we'd just torn our theater apart, did us in. The theater looked like a scale model of Ground Zero.

"People just stayed away," he said. "For about a year-and-a-half, ticket sales fell off by 50 percent. Just as we got back on our feet and felt the market starting to return, they came up with the color code for terror alerts. When it was in the blue, tickets sales were good. Then it would move into the orange and sales would go down. It was like we were tied to the code. It was horrible.

"Two years ago we completed the changes to the theater and things starting improving with The Wizard of Oz and Ragtime. Then we finally started to feel a strong heartbeat last February with Grease.

There is, however, another ongoing crisis with which Blackman has had to deal — the precipitous rise in workman's compensation expenses.

His company's costs, he said, have climbed from $30,000 a year to $30,000 a show, to the present cost of $100,000 per show.

To alleviate this burden, Blackman said he and his staff have been forced to adopt a policy of combining original productions with less expensive prepackaged shows such as The Fab Four, which is playing at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center.

"When you bring in a show [the booking agents] are responsible for their own workman's comp," Blackman explained.

"And if the company is incorporated in Maryland or Nevada [states with low workman's comp requirements], the cost is about $11," he added, derisively. "I save $100,000 by bringing in a show. What I have to do is balance the artistic integrity of what they are offering against the cost saving."

Eventually, Blackman is convinced, the regulations will be amended to put the type of work his company does in a special category. When that happens, he said, CLOSBC will return to its traditional role as a full-time producer of new shows.

But until that change comes about, he conceded, audiences can expect a mixed bag of new and prepackaged material, such as next season's combination of The Rat Pack and Oliver!

In addition to his other responsibilities, Blackman announced that he now plans to take over the post of artistic director recently vacated by Steve Ullman. It's a role, he said, he's ostensibly been filling for years.

"I think because of the fact that I don't share an educational background with the people who have sat in that position, I wasn't confident enough to speak up," Blackman said.

"I was insecure because I was a development director and a fund-raising executive. I always thought the company would be safer with someone in the artistic director position, because I could say, 'That guy went to Juilliard.' Then if we got a bad review I could say, 'Well, it was him (the artistic director's fault), not me.' I find a lot of artistic directors are intimidated by me because they've got a diploma and I have this Howard Hughes kind of retarded way of getting things done. When people have told me, 'You can't do that!' I say, 'Why not?' "

And how would Blackman define the current condition of his company?

"I think we've kind of been born again," he said. Then, with a laugh, he added, "What an awful statement."

PHOTO BY: ED KRIEGER