Oskar Eustis

OSKAR EUSTIS’ LONG GOODBYE

July 30, 2024 by Philip Boroff

EXCLUSIVE: Before the Public Theater fired a fifth of its staff, the downtown institution faced a financial crisis.

When it disclosed layoffs last July, the renowned nonprofit company said that it hoped to avoid a budget deficit in the year ending in August 2023. Instead, expenses exceeded revenue by $8 million that season, according to its most recent audited financial statement, which was obtained by Broadway Journal. That was the 70-year-old organization’s biggest budget deficit in at least a decade.Continue Reading

STAGE WORKERS UNION PUSH GOES PUBLIC

March 7, 2024 by Philip Boroff

The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, which has been busy organizing off-Broadway, has turned its attention to downtown Manhattan’s most storied and prolific producer.

On Wednesday, the management of the Public Theater declined a request by production workers at the 70-year-old institution to voluntarily recognize their petition to unionize under IATSE. In response, a group calling itself “Unionize the Public” posted on Instagram that it will seek an election supervised by a third party.Continue Reading

OSKAR EUSTIS IS NONPROFIT THEATER’S PANDEMIC PAY CHAMP (EXCLUSIVE)

August 10, 2022 by Philip Boroff

In 2020, a year in which theaters were dark for nine and a half months, Public Theater Artistic Director Oskar Eustis earned $1.15 million in pay and benefits, more than any other nonprofit theater leader in New York.

Eustis’ 10 percent jump in overall compensation — disclosed in the Public’s 2020-21 tax return filed with the New York Attorney General — runs counter to the company’s messaging about pandemic pay. In an April 2020 New York Times story about the cancellation of Shakespeare in the Park and planned staff furloughs, Michael Paulson reported that much of the remaining staff “will take up to a 25 percent pay cut. Eustis will take a 40 percent pay cut.”

The tax return, which details compensation for calendar year 2020, tells a different story. Eustis, one of the highest-profile figures in nonprofit theater since assuming leadership of the storied organization in 2005, was paid $901,000, up from $807,000 in 2019. Benefits and deferred pay were valued at an additional $255,000.Continue Reading

NONPROFIT PAY HITS $1M AS TURNOVER LOOMS: INDUSTRY SURVEY (EXCLUSIVE)

October 29, 2019 by Philip Boroff

André Bishop, head of Lincoln Center Theater, earned pay and benefits valued at $1 million in 2017. It’s likely the biggest one-year compensation for a New York nonprofit theater leader. Todd Haimes, artistic director and chief executive of the Roundabout Theatre Company, was close behind, with $922,000.

“More people who run theaters are realizing it’s very hard work and want to be paid for it,” said James Abruzzo, a recruiter and compensation consultant who’s hired by arts executives to negotiate their contracts with nonprofit boards. Those at the top who have management and artistic ability are scarce, he said. “Keeping leaders happy and keeping them close are the most important tasks of the board.”

In the previous decade, Bishop’s comp package doubled while Haimes’ rose 74 percent — increases at least four times the rate of inflation.Continue Reading

RIDING HIGH WITH ‘HAMILTON’ PROFITS, THEATER PLANS ‘PUBLIC STUDIOS’

October 7, 2019 by Philip Boroff

EXCLUSIVE: The Public Theater has earned tens of millions of dollars for its role developing Hamilton — and is spending as little of it as possible on two ambitious projects.

The venerable nonprofit is fundraising for a new rehearsal and audition space — dubbed Public Studios — that’s scheduled to open early next year across the street from its Astor Place headquarters. It’s also renovating the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, to be completed around 2022.Continue Reading

PUBLIC’S ‘HAMILTON’ RICHES COULD TOP $10 MILLION A YEAR

November 3, 2017 by Philip Boroff

EXCLUSIVE: The Public Theater could earn upwards of $10 million a year for helping to develop Hamilton: An American Musical. But don’t expect it to do anything flashy with the cash.

The plan for now is to plow money back into the institution — rather than bankrolling new shows on Broadway or making Public Theater tickets free year-round a la Shakespeare in the Park.

First up, according to two people familiar with the situation: an ambitious renovation to consolidate rehearsal space across the street, at 440 Lafayette, which will primarily replace facilities it rents around the city. And it’s setting aside reserves for capital expenses, operations and programming.

BROADWAY SHRUGS AT TRUMP PRODUCING CREDIT, COALESCES BEHIND CLINTON

September 19, 2016 by Philip Boroff

Donald Trump may be the only major-party presidential candidate in history with a Broadway producing credit, but that hasn’t won him much support in theater circles.

“All he was was a big investor,” said Richard Seff, who wrote the 1970 comedy Paris is Out!, about a longtime married couple planning a European vacation that played 112 performances at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre. “He didn’t have any input,” Seff said about Trump’s role. Now an 89-year-old reviewer and columnist for the website DC Metro Theater Arts, Seff recalled the second-generation real estate developer as a pleasant, stage-struck 23-year-old.