The Organic Regroups
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Since the resignation of Organic artistic director Richard Fire in the summer of 1992, the 24-year-old theater company’s artistic decisions have been made by a 26-person collective, a group of actors, directors, and other theater artists who have both decided what to show in the theater’s studio and main-stage spaces and been involved in directing, writing, and acting in most of the pieces. The collective has had some luck, most notably with In the Flesh, a sci-fi drama that enjoyed a long sold-out run in one of the Organic’s three studio spaces before moving to the main stage for about two months last summer. But the collective has had a hard time attracting audiences and covering expenses in the 400-seat main stage. Last fall it rented the stage out to the producers of Gilligan’s Island, which ran for two months. And Who Goes There?, the most recent Organic-produced main-stage show, closed abruptly last week after a brief run. Sources say the Organic spent heavily on advertising for the production. “It’s been difficult and expensive to keep the main stage programmed,” concedes executive director Jeff Neal, who says he does not know how large the theater company’s operating deficit is at the moment. “Yeah, we owe some money, but doesn’t everyone?” Board president Kathy Gillig estimates the debt to be in the low five figures.
