Exit Stage Business: Producer Payne Goes South
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One of the city’s most active commercial producing groups is about to lose a principal partner. The Payne-Leavitt Group is expected shortly to announce that cofounder Wes Payne is leaving–amicably, say sources–to take a non-theater-related job in New Orleans, where Payne’s wife’s relatives live. Fox Associates, the Saint Louis-based group that successfully produced Prelude to a Kiss and Lend Me a Tenor with Payne-Leavitt, will reportedly join with Michael Leavitt to continue producing in the Chicago market. (Leon Strauss, one of the principals at Fox, was at one time a leading contender to operate the restored Chicago Theatre.) Since the collapse of the producing team of Michael Cullen, Sheila Henaghan, and Howard Platt, Payne-Leavitt has emerged as the city’s most successful commercial producer. They own and operate the Apollo Theater Center and have a contract to manage and book the Wellington. Both Prelude to a Kiss and Lend Me a Tenor have enjoyed long runs; they’ve made back $684,000 in combined production costs and are beginning to turn a profit. Michael Leavitt would not discuss any pending developments within the organization. “We’ll have an announcement shortly,” he said.
Representatives from the financially strapped Wisdom Bridge Theatre met with executives from Civic Stages Chicago (formerly the Civic Center for Performing Arts) last week to discuss payment of a $28,000 debt left over from Wisdom Bridge’s productions of Kabuki Faust and Hamlet at the Civic Theatre in 1987. The former Civic Center had sued to obtain the funds. According to a source familiar with last week’s meeting, Wisdom Bridge said it would try to repay 50 percent of the outstanding debt over three years. The source said a statement of assets and liabilities given to Civic Stages before the meeting listed Wisdom Bridge’s liabilties at approximately $750,000 and assets at about $300,O00.
Ginsburg spent about $7,000 of his own money to produce each recording (available only on compact disc), and he must sell about 1,500 copies of each to break even. His best-seller to date, a collection of Russian piano music performed by Paperno, has sold approximately 700 copies. With a recent change in distributor and ads in key classical music magazines, Ginsburg hopes he will begin to see a return on his investment. Cedille recordings are available in local outlets of Rose Records and Sound Warehouse. Sales at Sound Warehouse have tailed off recently, but Mark Jenkins, the classical music buyer at Rose Records on Wabash, says Ginsburg “puts out a quality product” and seems to be on the right track. “The market has been flooded with mainstream classical repertoire, so for Cedille to find a niche it makes sense to record the more esoteric material.”
Curator Leaving MCA
