Inside LA Stage History: The 99-seat/AEA Wars, Part One

@ This Stage: One evening in February 1981, I ventured to the Solari Theatre at 205 N. Canon Drive in Beverly Hills to see Arthur Miller’s The Price. The classic four-hander, directed by Guy Stockwell, featured one of my favorite actresses, Carrie Snodgrass, with John Saxon, Harold Gary, and the Theatre’s founder, Rudy Solari. When I arrived, I learned the performance was canceled. Solari was standing near the box office, so I asked him why there was no show that night. “Bullshit,” he mumbled, “a whole lot of Actors Equity bullshit.” That was my first and last conversation with a man who worked very hard to establish a live theater venue in LA.