Vote likely on Grove Theater

The Garden Grove City Council may decide tonight to terminate Grove Theater Center’s operation of the Village Green Cultural Arts Complex, which includes the outdoor Festival Amphitheater and the indoor Gem Theater.

A panel appointed by the council unanimously recommended the ouster in November. The ad hoc panel was established in April after the council voted 4-1 to give the Grove three months to change its policies in order to generate more performances, including rental production by other community groups, and acquire nonprofit status.

The panel also endorsed the idea of replacing Grove with Shakespeare Orange County, a professional company housed at Chapman University in Orange. The Shakespeare company’s artistic director, Thomas A. Bradac, previously founded and operated the Grove Shakespeare Festival, which was the Grove Theater Center’s predecessor at Village Green. Bradac left the Shakespeare company in 1991, it collapsed in 1993, and the current Grove took over in 1994.

Grove artistic director Kevin Cochran said Monday that his company’s main focus is to be a professional company, and that “we very much see Grove Theater Center remaining active” in other locations regardless of its status at the Village Green. He said the company has applied for nonprofit status but has not yet secured approval.

Mark Leyes, the lone “no” in the April vote, said that he hasn’t changed his mind and that the Shakespeare company proposal “sounds pie in the sky.”

But Bradac said his plan “is imminently doable if there is an alliance in the community to make it work.” He said this community focus would be the major difference between his previous stewardship and his latest plan.