In a post-Sept. 11 economy, the performing arts are suffering in Austin and around the country. Low ticket sales and declining contributions are forcing some organizations to tighten their belts creatively.
Last year was a challenging one for the arts community. The Austin Lyric Opera fired one of its founding members, the Austin Musical Theatre couldn't afford to finish its season, and the city slashed arts funding by 33 percent across the board.
With these uncontrollable events behind them, the need for adequate performing space persists along with a fierce competition for patrons' dollars.
How did the state of the arts get to this juncture, many call, critical to the city's future?
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Ticket slump
Low-ticket sales are affecting Austin's performing arts scene.
 
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At the height of the company's success in the late 1990s, the Austin Lyric Opera (est. 1986) spent about $500,000 on each of its productions under General Director Joseph McClain.
"We had built the largest audience for the performing arts in Central Texas in those years. We'd established an international reputation for a level of artistic excellence that was totally not to be expected of a town our size and a company this age," McClain said.
However, after the 2001 terrorist attacks and the subsequent plunge in the economy, the opera struggled and the board of directors had to make some difficult decisions.
"Quite frankly, Joe's artistic ambitions were greater than the financial resources that this company was facing during an economic downturn," Lyric Opera Managing Director Tamara Hale said.
In October 2002, the opera fired McClain.
"I was stunned because I had never had -- no one had ever -- thought to give me a review," McClain said.
After McClain's departure, the company eliminated nine positions and cut its young artists program to balance the budget for its upcoming 17th season.
Arts leaders said the opera's situation is not unique.
"The arts across the nation are facing a funding crisis in the sense that traditional means of funding the arts are all down," Latifah Taormina, executive director of Austin Circle of Theatres, said.
"We can't blame everything on Sept. 11 because I remember WWII, and that didn't stop the culture in the United States," Jane Sibley, Austin Symphony Orchestra board chairman, said.
Some groups almost didn't make it. Halfway through its 2002-2003 season, the Austin Musical Theatre ran out of money and canceled the rest of its scheduled productions at the Paramount Theatre.
"So, it left us with quite a big hole in terms of our calendar. Dates that were open in the theatre and time in the theatre translates into revenue for us," Paramount Theatre Programming Director Paul Beutel said.
An average Austin Musical Theatre production costs close to $1 million and the company just wasn't drawing the audiences to break even, much less make a profit.
"Austin Musical Theatre presented musicals the likes of which nobody else does here in town and part of the reason is they spend the money. The money they spend I can honestly say is all on stage," Greater Tuna producer Charles Duggan said.
Duggan bailed out the struggling company just in time. They changed their name and their image.
"We decided to take the Texas move and be bold and be big and brave and to expand. We decided to expand the name of Austin Musical Theatre and it turned into Broadway Texas," Duggan said.
However, not every arts organization was forced to cut back.
The Austin Symphony Orchestra, the oldest performing group (est. 1911) in the city, came out of the post Sept. 11 crisis unharmed.
"We just sort of tightened our belts and continued on and tried to raise money and sell more tickets. So, we were very fortunate in that we weathered the storm," Jim Reagan, executive director for ASO, said.
Sibley believes the economy shouldn't bring arts organizations to a standstill.
"If they can't support themselves through earnings and donations, then let them go out of business. You can't falsify and prop up things that are not really working," she said.
Economic studies show performing arts are a billion-dollar industry in Texas, but no numbers on the arts' contribution to the Austin economy has been presented to the city council.
"There really has not been an economic impact study formally conducted by the arts and it's something that the arts community is talking about right now," Cookie Ruiz, executive director for Ballet Austin, said. "Arts are not a drain on the community, but they actually do generate economic impact in terms of our audiences and the kind of quality of life that we partner with the Chamber of Commerce and we partner with the economic development of our city in bringing conferences here and bringing people to move here and helping to bring, and to promote excellent, innovative businesses to come here. The arts are a part of that."
Currently, a 10-city arts impact study administered by the Urban Institute in Washington is collecting data on the habits, thoughts and feelings of performing arts audiences in the chosen regions across the United States. Austin is one of the 10 cities and results from the study are expected to be ready in the fall, Ruiz said.
