Los Angeles Times: Less than three months after announcing its stages would have to remain dark through April, Center Theatre Group confirmed Friday that COVID-19 closures have forced the company to lay off 91 previously furloughed employees, a mix of full- and part-timers who account for 53% of its workforce.
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This is quite a shame. Having met some of the technical staff and crew working under the Center Theatre Group, it is noticeably clear that everyone there is deeply passionate about theatre and their jobs. Having to lay off 53 percent of their employees (totaling 91 employees) must have been a hard decision to make, and a sad one. The three stages they maintain are quite quirky and pose interesting challenges to solve for every season and this is one of the things that makes the productions put on their even more interesting. In all this unfortunate news, it is likely the best outcome. Unfortunately, they are in one of the hearts of Los Angeles and Covid-19 is posing a real problem in Los Angeles and the state of California. They are likely to remain closed much longer than preferred under less pandemic like circumstances and they aren’t a money-making, profit-oriented company like Disney who can withstand going under to a better degree. Hopefully, they will be up and at it again before we know it!
As a fellow Los Angeleno like my colleague Nicolaus over here, this is most definitely quite a shame for the city. Sure, Los Angeles has never been the theater town, but Center Theater Group has worked for years to bring theater to our citizens and it has also made a name for itself on a national scale. Another shame is that this was supposed to be their comeback year. As a theater, they've managed to lay low for the past couple of years, not really producing any broadway shows, mostly operating as a road house for tours coming in. This year, they were going to be the location for the pre-broadway run of 1776 directed by Diane Paulus- which was going to be a big boost putting Los Angeles back on the map as a pit stop for shows on their way to broadway. Like Nicolaus said, LA isn't doing too hot with the virus right now and its a shame to see CTG be victim to that.
It is truly heartbreaking to see what the industry has come down to during this global pandemic. CAs someone studying in hopes of going into this field of work, it saddens me to see closures of pretty much every show across the country including the entirety of Broadway because of Covid-19. In this instance with the Center Theatre Group, I somehow categorize it to be worse in my mind because it is both a “not for profit,” but also located in Los Angeles where prices just for living are already extremely high. My heart goes out to those who work in marketing and sales as well as to those artists, actors, designers, and stage workers who were not even counted in this group of layoffs. I remain optimistic in their reopening and rehiring to the people who lost their jobs there, the Broad Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and Hollywood Bowl.
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