Founded in 1987 (relatively recently for a major regional theatre) Palm Beach's Florida Stage dedicated itself to new writing, and made a good run at it.
Now they're bankrupt and shutting down . For good.
They're claiming Madoff fallout, but looks like they had other problems, too.
A nice appreciation of the company--and roundup of local reactions--on the blog, South Florida Theatre Scene.
Thanks for the link!
ReplyDeleteA lot of the shortages in Palm Beach really do come back to Madoff. Florida Stage lost backers, Ballet Florida lost even more. A producer of another company was telling me that the day after the Madoff story broke, one of his long-time supporters (who had just donated $10k) called to ask for his donation back - it turned out that it was the only actual cash he had - Madoff had "made off" with the rest.
And we're still seeing ticket sales evaporate as people remain unemployed, and retirees lose their benefits - or have them reduced.