South Coast Rep Announces 2010-11 Officers, Season Highlights

At South Coast Repertory's Annual Meeting on July 28, Board President Wylie A. Aitken announced that the theatre had ended its 46th consecutive season in the black and introduced the slate of officers for 2010-11, headed by incoming President Thomas D. Phelps. The unanimously elected executive committee, along with nine new Board members, will lead the theatre during its 47th Season.

Aitken retires from the Board after completing a ten-year term, extended one year beyond the usual nine to serve a second term as Board President. "We have successfully weathered difficult economic times," he said, "and-thanks to strong underwriting and dedicated leadership from SCR Trustees-have raised over $2.8 million to meet the theatre's $8.4 million operating budget."

ANNUAL MEETING HIGHLIGHTS

Officers unanimously elected to serve during SCR's 47th Season are

Tod White, Vice President, Advancement; John J. Murphy, Vice President, Development; Damien Jordan, Vice President, Finance (second year); and Gail M. Doe, Vice President, Community Relations.

The nine new members welcomed to the roster are the largest class of incoming trustees in 15 years. They are community leader Bette Aitken; William R. Cave, Market President, U.S. Bank; Brian Durkin, Division Vice President of Finance, Controller, Abbott Medical Optics, Inc.; Robert S. Holcombe, Executive Vice President, General Consul & Secretary, Apria Healthcare, Inc.; Timothy J. Kay, Partner, Snell & Wilmer, LLP; community leader William A. Klein; John G. Prichard, Co-Founder Knightsbridge Asset Management, LLC, CFA; Alan Slutzky, Owner, Partner, Merchant Capital Source and William M. Weinberg, Attorney, Weinberg Law.

Completing their nine-year tenures as trustees and recognized for their service were five strong SCR supporters who will continue to play roles in the theatre even as they retire from the Board. Along with Aitken, they are Lawrence M. Higby, Linda Hovee, Thomas B. Rogers and Elaine J. Weinberg.

2008-09 SEASON HIGHLIGHTS

Total attendance for 2009-10 was 117,666 for the five-play Segerstrom Stage season, the four-play Argyros Stage season, the three-play season of Theatre for Young Audiences and the holiday show A Christmas Carol.

Among the 46th Season's achievements was the seventh successful year of SCR's Theatre for Young Audiences, which included 30 free matinees for more than 7,000 Orange County schoolchildren, thanks in part to major grants from The Nicholas Endowment and The Segerstrom Foundation, The Hearst Foundations, Bank of America, The Capital Group Companies and Pacific Life Foundation, with additional support from Robert & LaDorna Eichenberg.

More than 1,500 people, including 84 representatives from 42 theatres and arts organizations across the country, attended the Pacific Playwrights Festival (PPF) April 23-25. The thirteenth annual PPF continued SCR's tradition of developing new work, with a weekend of five play readings and full productions of two world premieres, Julia Cho's The Language Archive on the Segerstrom Stage and Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa's Doctor Cerberus on the Argyros Stage.

Instrumental in helping SCR commission, develop and produce world premieres and support PPF and a full array of play development programs were The Shubert Foundation, the Elizabeth George Foundation, The National Endowment for the Arts, with special thanks to The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust and The Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation.

After the Annual Meeting, Trustees gathered in the SCR lobby for cocktails followed by the Annual Dinner, which included a large-screen retrospective of the 2009-10 Season. The presentation took its title from the opening production of the season,

Putting It Together. Hosted by actors Larry Bates, Richard Doyle, Linda Gehringer, Geoffrey Lower and Jenny Parsons, it highlighted each play and revealed how many of the fascinating elements in the season's shows were put together.

As the evening drew to a close, Artistic Directors David Emmes and Martin Benson presented a preview of the upcoming 2010-11 Season and thanked the retiring Board members for their dedicated service to the theatre.

Twenty-two individuals, seven corporations and one foundation were presented with framed mementos for their generous gifts that helped underwrite the 46th Season.

SCR's 47th Season opens on the Segerstrom Stage September 17 with George Bernard Shaw's Misalliance, directed by Benson, who has won an unprecedented seven Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards, three of them for Shaw productions. Casey Stangl will direct the new hit play In the Next Room or the vibrator play by Sarah Ruhl, which opens the Argyros Stage season on October 1.

Prior to these exciting openings on SCR's two stages, the Orange County social season will kick off on September 11 with SCR's Gala Ball, "The Play's the Thing," chaired by Sophie Cripe at the Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort & Spa.

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