Broad Stage in spotlight
By DAILY PRESS STAFF
SM BLVD After 10 years of consulting with internationally lauded performing artists and administrators on their vision of a “dream venue,” The Eli and Edythe Broad Stage opens with two sold-out concerts, the first to be held tonight at the grand opening.
Broadway Legend Barbara Cook inaugurates the performing arts center in a program featuring songs composed by Stephen Sondheim, Rogers and Hammerstein, Rogers and Hart, and Cole Porter. Mezzo- Soprano Frederica von Stade opens the 2008-09 season with a concert featuring the Los Angeles premiere of Jake Heggie’s “At the Statue of Venus,” with Soprano Kristin Clayton and Libretto by Terrence McNally. That show is scheduled for Oct. 11.
The Eli and Edythe Broad Stage is the only Los Angeles performing arts center of its kind in both design and artistic intent. Envisioned by opera singer turned director Dale Franzen and actor Dustin Hoffman as a “global theater,” the Stage aspires to be more than a traditional performing arts venue. In addition to presenting renowned and respected artists, the long-term vision is to serve as a “laboratory of creative spontaneity,” where performing artists can nurture new work and collaborate in all performance disciplines and where audiences of all ages and backgrounds are welcomed into a more intimate arts experience.
“The Westside of Los Angeles has never had anything of its kind,” Hoffman, chairman of the Artistic Advisory Board, said. “What makes it unique is that it’s a stage for dance, opera, and musicals …. It’s also an intimate theater and it looks great.”
Prior to the gala inaugural opening, the Stage presented three “soft-openings” in August to test the versatility of the multi-use performance hall’s unique acoustical design.
Designed by Santa Monica-based architect Renzo Zecchetto and with acoustic design by Mark Holden, chairman and director of design for internationally renowned firm Jaffe Holden Acoustics, The Broad Stage posed a particular acoustical challenge. Holden worked in close collaboration with Zecchetto tweaking the angles of the walls without altering the basic geometric structure.
Given the hall’s multi-use programming and unique interior geometry, The Broad Stage provided challenges for Jaffe Holden, whose architectural acoustics have been celebrated in some of the world’s major performing arts centers, including the Kennedy Center and Lincoln Center.
Architecturally, the Stage is unique in providing the intimate immediacy of a 499-seat hall yet with a variable proscenium and a stage comparable to UCLA’s 1,833-seat Royce Hall, able to accommodate a full orchestra, even beyond a 45-musician orchestra pit.
Designed and built from the Stage out to suit the sensibilities of world-class artists, presenting work on any scale, and with artistic dimensions that embrace the creative process from inception to opening night, the Stage is poised to become a vital and visionary cultural catalyst for Westside audiences and for the city at large, said Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky.
“The Westside has always contributed generously to the performing arts of Los Angeles but this may be our greatest contribution yet,” Yaroslavsky said.
The Broad Stage was built at a cost of $45 million, financed with a $35 million bond measure passed by the cities of Santa Monica and Malibu in 2004; $5 million from other government agencies and from private donors; and a bond measure for Santa Monica College improvements passed in 2002.
“Embedded in the original Santa Monica College charter is the call for a performing arts center, so the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage fulfills our mandate and our traditions,” said Chui L. Tsang, president of Santa Monica College. “Like KCRW, it is also a community ‘service’ of Santa Monica College, a world-class global theater befitting our identity as a world-class leader in education.”
In its first season, educational program-ming also takes the spotlight with a slate of master classes, workshops, a residency, a lecture demonstration and open rehearsals. Free Family concerts will feature creative interaction with performers, including drumming improvisation, or celebrate significant achievements and individuals in arts and culture.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 20, 2008. Read the original PDF.