Dance Company Faces Buy-or-Move Deadline

Dancer-choreographer Lula Washington says she has two months to come up with $225,000 to buy the mid-city Masonic Temple that her L.A. Contemporary Dance Theatre has been renting as a studio--or she’s out in the streets.

Even if Washington can meet these demands, it will cost her an additional $150,000 to bring the structure up to earthquake codes.

Washington and her family have refinanced their own home to help secure loans for the effort. But there are no viable alternatives, according to Washington: Rent elsewhere would be triple.

For Washington and several other local dance companies, it’s a Sisyphean task trying to hold onto dance and performance studio space. As property values increase, the dance and performance art renters can’t afford the ever-increasing rents. And an additional problem here are the requirements in the Los Angeles Basin for earthquake-proof structures, which adds costs that are passed on to renters.

Having to move would “would stop 90%” of the rehearsal and performance activity of the nine-member, nine-year-old company, Washington says. But this isn’t all that’s at stake.

“The thing that’s really jeopardized is the after-school latch-key programs,” she says. “The free classes for kids who wouldn’t ordinarily have the luxury.”

Gone too will be other community benefits. “When we first came here it was a mess, lots of drug activity right here that we literally had to step over to get into the studio,” says Washington, who has occupied the building on West Adams near the Santa Monica Freeway and La Brea for seven years.

“But people just want the dollars. They’re not concerned about what goes in the space.”

As a last-ditch effort, L.A. Contemporary Dance Theatre is trying to remain in its building by putting together a partnership with members of its board to get personal credit loans.

To date, there are commitments from four out of the necessary six persons, including board president Nina Shaw, who is putting her personal financial stability at risk to help the company.

The company has scheduled fund-raising events showcasing the company’s dancers and other groups at the studio, at 8 p.m. every Saturday in August and September.

A larger fund-raiser featuring celebrity guests is being planned for Nov. 2 at the Wilshire Ebell. Meanwhile, dance students and their parents are contributing to the effort in with walk-a-thons, cookie and button sales.

Other companies, however, may not be so lucky. The Ebony Showcase Theatre, a 300-seat theater just blocks from Washington’s building, houses rehearsals for several dance groups in its annex. Founded in the 1950s by Nick and Edna Stewart, this group was almost forced to close recently due to earthquake renovation costs and still remains endangered. Dance Wonderland, a mid-city studio, recently relocated due to high rent, like many other groups.

These groups could very well join the ranks of the many dance and performance spaces, presenters and troupes that had to close or relocate in recent years: the Variety Arts Center, the House, L.A. Institute for Contemporary Art, the Nighthouse, the Lhasa Club, the Wallenboyd and others.

On the upside, however, a countertrend looks to be in the making. The Inner City Cultural Center’s C. Bernard Jackson reports that the center recently acquired the Ivar Theater in Hollywood and is once again programming dance. And the Highways performance and dance space in Santa Monica opened in May.

But Heidi Ashley of the Dance Resource Center describes the local situation as “pitiful.”

“During the last five years, even established studios have been losing their spaces,” she says. “Here in L.A., we have a phenomenally high dollar value per square foot, so it’s a chronic problem. And there aren’t as many (people) trying to run studios now, so when we do lose them it hits even harder.”