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| I urge every Pentacle member to read all the letters I have posted, to see why I firmly believe something very wrong happened with the board's handling of the CD project, and that the future stability of the theatre is in jeopardy when business is conducted in this manner. |
Statesman Journal 9/14/03 Ron Cowan
Pentacle voids plans for ‘Metropolis’ CD
Pentacle Theatre’s original cast CD of the musical “Metropolis” will not be released as previously anticipated because the director of the November production and the Pentacle board failed to agree on legal arrangements.*
The theater’s governing board debated for seven months before reaching the decision to veto the plan.
“The official line the board took is that, for legal reasons only, the Pentacle board cannot support this project,” said Lee Ann Reed, Pentacle general manager. "We will not be specific as to what those legal reasons are."*
Board president Dave Davis said from the time the board members are elected, it is drummed into them that they have a responsibility to keep the theater safe: physically, legally and financially.
"We just decided we could not commit ourselves to this project and continue to commit ourselves to keep the theater safe,” Davis said. “There were just too many legal questions."
Randy Bowser, director of “Metropolis” and producer of the CD, said, “I am deeply disappointed with the board’s decision. "I know the cast is dismayed also. Hundreds of volunteer hours over a five-month period of time went into the production of the completed recording.”
The recording was mastered by Frank Fullerton at his Fullertone Studio in Salem.
The Academy Award winning composer of “Metropolis,” Joe Brooks, had agreed to allow the release of the CD, with the proceeds divided between him and Pentacle’s ongoing capital campaign.
"The contract with him is now null and void, and there is no possibility of releasing the CD under any new circumstances,” Bowser said.
NOTES
In this entry from Cowan's "Arts Notes", he quotes my letter-to-the-editor published in The Statesman just days before.
*The first paragraph, about the board and I not agreeing to the legalities is a vague, innacurate statement that I suppose could be Cowan's capsulization of whatever the theatre's office told him.
The quotes from Lee Ann Reed and Dave Davis are new, and reiterate the vague claim that there were "legal reasons" for not releasing the CD which cannot be fully disclosed.
Claiming executive priviledge, the board has never fully explained to me or anyone else what those supposed legal concerns are. I do know that two attorneys said the contract between Pentacle and Joe Brooks was sound.
Elsewhere, throughout this collection of letters re: the CD, I ask the logical question "Was there an actual legal threat?" It is a question which gains even more validity after the above article was published, and even yet more in light of the anonymous threat I received.