Claiming he was deliberately excluded from a top-to-bottom plan to reorganize artistically and administratively, James Houghton, artistic director of the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's Playwrights Conference since August 1999, abruptly resigned on Wed., Oct. 29. The O'Neill's board chairman and its executive director both have countered Houghton's claim.
The sudden resignation took the theatre community by surprise, coming just five weeks after Houghton's decision, announced publicly Mon., Sept. 15, that the O'Neill would "suspend" indefinitely its longstanding policy of open submissions, a move that quickly provoked discord in the national playwriting community. The resignation also came following the O'Neill's receipt of a letter, written by a three-time Playwrights Conference alum, questioning Houghton's claim that the decision was largely based on the state of the institution's finances.
According to a written statement, Houghton's resignation, which took effect immediately, will not affect his work as founding artistic director of Signature Theatre Company or artistic advisor to the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis.
"In the past four years," the statement reads, "I have worked with the board of trustees to confront the ongoing financial and administrative crisis of the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. I have just recently discovered, in a recent meeting with its executive director, that a decision was made in August by the board of trustees, without input or participation from the center's artistic leadership, for a long-term survival strategy that would impact all of the center's programming. The very essence of leadership, whether it be artistic, administrative, or by a board, cannot flourish without a fundamental bond of trust." His resignation, therefore, is the "result of that bond having been broken."
In an email exchange with Back Stage, Houghton declined to be interviewed for this article.
Both Tom Viertel, chairman of the O'Neill's board of trustees, and Amy Sullivan, its newly installed executive director, have not only countered that Houghton was aware of the board's reorganization plans but that he had been present at meetings when the plans were being drawn up, discussed, and approved. Viertel, for example, told The New York Times that Houghton first learned of the plans in July.
In an interview with Back Stage, Sullivan, who assumed her position only eight weeks ago, said she understood "Jim was aware that the board had approved a direction toward a centralized, resident artistic director, and in my conversations with him I did tell him multiple times that the intention of the board had been that this would be a two- to three-year process." The O'Neill's economics were such, she said, "that we needed to accelerate the discussion."
Sullivan said that in July, "The O'Neill's board of directors did its due diligence in terms of analyzing and reviewing our financial situation, like all boards of all arts organizations have to do. There was a long-range planning committee, led by a strategist from Pfizer, Dr. Nancy Hutson, and a strategy for the institution's future was presented to the board at an open meeting, with it approving the direction it was recommended for us to go."
With the O'Neill's long-range strategy ratified by the board, Sullivan continued, "It was our intention to engage Jim Houghton and the other artistic directors in implementing it. Our intention was to say, 'Let's put our heads together, let's roll up our sleeves, and let's begin to go down this course together.' This was the conversation I hoped to have with Jim, and I regret deeply that he felt excluded from this process." The board, Sullivan said, remains motivated "by its mission to serve the American theatre and the American playwright."
A Plethora of Programs
Since its inception nearly 40 years ago, the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center has been a hodgepodge of fiefdomlike programs, including an annual Critics Institute, a Music Theater Conference, a Puppetry Conference, and the actor-training National Theater Institute, with a separate artistic leader for each. The board, Sullivan said, had elected to give the O'Neill a more centralized artistic scope and Houghton was aware of the new strategy.
On Thurs., Oct. 23, Sullivan "met with Jim to discuss the possibility of accelerating the board's long-range plans. Jim resigned verbally at that time. I left the meeting with nothing in writing but with the very sincere hope that we could come back to the table and talk again. There was even the possibility of a joint statement. The next thing I knew I got a call from The New York Times asking about his resignation."
Despite hurt feelings all around ("I'm sorry that we couldn't turn this into a friendly and orderly transition," Viertel told the Times), Sullivan said next year's Playwrights Conference is still going forward. "There will be an edition of the Playwrights Conference next summer. I'm not in a position to tell you right now what it will look like, how long it will last, or who will be involved, but we are continuing to receive submissions and the submission plan Jim put in place is still in process." Still, Sullivan said Houghton's decision -- to move from an open submission policy to one in which 150 nationwide nominators will submit a play of their choice for consideration -- will be "taken under review" by the board at some future time.
In a Sept. 19 Back Stage interview, Beth Whitaker, who served under Houghton as artistic associate for the Playwrights Conference, said the identities of the nominators will remain secret for now. Sullivan declined to release their names. She also declined to indicate whether Whitaker will remain affiliated with the Playwrights Conference.
As for the O'Neill's monetary woes, Sullivan said that the O'Neill's finances are "in a critical situation, one that we are addressing. And the way we're going to resolve the situation is by making very hard decisions as a team, not in isolation, for what is best for the O'Neill and its programs. I am confident we will weather this -- I'm more confident than I would have been two years ago in terms of what is being done by the board to stabilize our finances, to make our organization function more smoothly, and to position us for aggressive fundraising."
At press time, Lex Leifheit, a press spokesperson for the O'Neill, told Back Stage that the institution will appoint "a resident artistic director within a week to 10 days," and that his or her focus "will be the implementation of the Playwrights Conference." The O'Neill also announced the hiring of a new development director, Sara Qua, who will help "launch a challenge grant of $100,000, with a goal of raising an additional $150,000" for the institution.
Farrell Fires Away
While Sullivan explained that Houghton's nominator policy has to remain for now "because it's so far along" (the deadline is Dec. 1), she also chose neither to defend nor endorse it. Turning to another matter, she declined to discuss an Oct. 15 letter from Herman Daniel Farrell III, a three-time O'Neill alumnus, which questions both the ethics and the underlying fiduciary facts Houghton cited in his decision to end the open submissions policy.
In his Sept. 15 statement, for example, Houghton said the O'Neill does not "have the means currently to increase support in order to consider [the] growing number of applications in a fair and thorough process." In various press reports, moreover, the O'Neill's six-figure operating deficit has been cited as a factor in Houghton's decision.
A produced playwright, Farrell is also an attorney licensed to practice law in New York and the son of Herman Farrell, Jr., a powerful 15-term Democratic state assemblyman. His 3,000-word letter, provided to Back Stage, was mailed to Sullivan, Viertel, Houghton, and every member of the O'Neill's board of trustees individually, arriving roughly two days before Houghton's resignation. Sullivan, however, denied any connection between the letter and Houghton's departure.
Still, Farrell's letter takes a comprehensive look at the O'Neill's financial picture, using the publicly available Form 990s the organization is required to file as a not-for-profit.
"Mr. Houghton's sudden decision [to end open submissions] and his comments in the press have raised numerous questions in my mind as to the veracity of the statements and the actual motive for this fundamental change in the submissions process for the O'Neill Playwrights Conference," Farrell writes in his letter. Since the O'Neill "charged an application fee of $15, isn't it true that the increased number of applicants would result in increased means to process the applications?" And why, he asked, could the staff of the conference during the 1990s "read, cover-to-cover, 1,200-1,500 plays each year, at $10 per full-length play, while?under Mr. Houghton's play-reading process, 900 scripts at $15 per application (initially only a synopsis and sample pages) is the most the system can bear?"
Farrell also attacked the artistic rationale behind the shift to a nominator process. "How can it be more fair than an open submissions process that fosters equal opportunity and equal access for all applicants?" Under a system of stealth nominators, he argued, a playwright "will have to know someone, know someone who knows someone, and/or ultimately be liked" in order to be submitted, a dynamic that could lead playwrights "to schmooze, fraternize, work the circuit, and participate in sundry other ridiculous endeavors having nothing to do with the quality of the contents of their plays in order to get [them] submitted."
After questioning many line items in the O'Neill's Form 990s -- including the doubling of the Playwrights Conference's budget -- Farrell asked the board to consider whether there is "the potential for discrimination, self-dealing, nepotism, and other questionable acts by members of the [Playwrights Conference] which could expose you and the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center to liability." Indeed, he inquires, how will the board know that "nominators have not discriminated or that they do not have some pecuniary or private interest in the plays that they submit?"
Finally, Farrell's letter ends with a plea. "I just don't get how [an] organization dedicated to giving an outlet for American playwright voices [can] respond at this moment in time by seeking to limit rather than expand its ability to get in contact with those voices. We are living through an epoch and the playwriting comes with it. Please do not respond to this flood of artistic expression in this manner. The O'Neill should be a funnel right now. Not a dam."
Sullivan told Back Stage that while she would have no comment on Farrell's letter for now, the board was scheduled to discuss it at its meeting on Sat., Nov. 1.