By all appearances, the Colorado Ballet seemed to be riding a financial and artistic wave the past year – one that would carry it in style into its late September debut in the new Ellie Caulkins Opera House.
The company had raised about $1 million in 2003-04, erasing a cumulative deficit of $210,000. Imaginative new marketing efforts were paying off, with significantly improved subscription sales.
In September, the company signed a $1.2 million contract to buy the Temple Events Center, 1595 Pearl St., for its new headquarters and later announced plans to raise $4 million for a renovation and expansion.
And in March, the company traveled to New York to present its third performance at the Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts, gaining favorable reviews in The New York Times and elsewhere.
But just as these milestones seemed to signal an exciting new era for the company, dangerous cracks were developing in the company’s financial, artistic and organizational foundation.
They became at least partially public last week with the revelations that the company’s executive director, Rick Tallman, had resigned along with his wife, Angela, another staff member and at least six board members, including chairwoman Elisabeth Armstrong.
The difficulties started about six months ago, said Jane Hermann, agent for choreographer Christopher Wheeldon. The company apparently realized it might not be able to raise the $800,000-$1 million it needed to mount a new balletic adaptation of “Alice in Wonderland.”
That was a big problem, since it had signed a contract with Wheeldon, one of the company’s pre-eminent ballet choreographers, to create the work.
And it had already announced the ballet’s world premiere in May 2004 as a cornerstone of the grand opening of the $88.8 million Ellie Caulkins Opera House, set to be the company’s prime venue.
Rather than seek some kind of accommodation with Wheeldon, the company tried to get several other companies to collaborate on the project. But Hermann said this violated the terms of the contract.
Details of what else happened between Colorado Ballet and Wheeldon are unknown, but when Martin Fredmann, the company’s artistic director, announced the ballet’s 2005-06 season earlier this month, “Alice in Wonderland” was nowhere to be seen.
Make no mistake – to go from a world premiere that would have garnered the company international attention to a replacement that could be mounted anytime was a huge setback.
The ballet let down its two partners in the Caulkins Opera Theater’s opening – Opera Colorado and Denver’s Division of Theatres & Arenas – by essentially not holding up its end of the bargain.
While the ballet struggled to raise funds for “Alice in Wonderland,” Opera Colorado managed to mount a spectacular gala on Sept. 10 with opera star Renée Fleming and hire a New York public relations expert to promote the new opera house.
The ballet’s bungled dealings with Wheeldon have given it a black eye in the ballet world, something that will take years to overcome. Anger could be heard in Hermann’s voice as she described her negotiations with Fredmann.
“From a legal point of view, they owe him the whole contract,” she said of Wheeldon and his agreement with ballet. “They’re in breach. But if we don’t pursue it, it’s out of the benevolence of Mr. Wheeldon’s consideration for a company that has gotten itself into trouble.”
Although no one will acknowledge it on the record, it seems clear that the failure to realize “Alice in Wonderland” and the company’s dealings with Wheeldon were the catalyst for the recent mass exodus of staff and board leaders.
The new officials conscripted to take over on an interim basis have tried to downplay these departures, saying they are a natural occurrence any time a major leader, such as an executive director, steps down.
“New people will step up as well as the people still involved. No, I’m not worried,” said Christin Crampton Day, one of two members temporarily heading the board.
Such comments sound blindly optimistic. The problem is that the leaders who left cannot easily be replaced. Tallman was the kind of smart, enterprising administrator all too rare in the arts world.
At the same time, Armstrong and her husband, William, were big funders of the ballet – one of just two couples listed in the ballet’s most recent program in the top donor category of $100,000 or more. Such big-league contributors are tough to find.
No matter how good a face officials try to put on them, these developments spell trouble for the ballet. And they raise significant questions about Fredmann’s future with company.
It’s hard to not see the resignations as no-confidence votes in the artistic director, who has held the post for 18 years. While Fredmann seems to have the support of the rest of the board for now, it is easy to wonder how long that will last, especially if the company experiences more difficulties.
Two approaching events will offer considerable clues about the company’s future health and direction. At the end of May – a month later than originally scheduled – it is supposed to close on its purchase of the Temple Events Center. Will that still happen?
In addition, the ballet’s 2005 fiscal year ends June 30. Will it finish in the black or run another deficit?
People in and outside the arts community will be watching and waiting to find out.
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-820-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com.
