You know the saying “It doesn’t rain but it pours”? Well, you can apply it to the Austin arts as easily as anything else. Whenever the local arts scene sees a big change in personnel at one organization, it’s almost never an isolated event. Shortly after the news of that breaks, another area arts organization will also undergo a significant change in personnel, and then comes a third and sometimes a fourth, and we’ll be drenched with personnel shake-ups. Most often, it seems to occur among the organizations that produce art, but this time around it seems to be taking place among the organizations that serve the organizations that produce art. Last month, it was Ann Ciccolella leaving her longtime post as executive director of the Austin Circle of Theatres. Now comes word that Michelle Polgar (who is married to Austin Chronicle arts writer Robi Polgar) has resigned her position as executive director of Artists’ Legal and Accounting Assistance of Austin. Polgar has been at the helm of the nonprofit for the last few years, during which time she has helped raise its profile as a resource for low-income artists and arts organizations in need of legal and accounting services and affordable education opportunities on arts-related business matters. The reason for Polgar’s resignation was not known at press time, although a small addition to the Polgar family a few months ago (hi, Kaitlyn!) may have been a contributing factor. In any case, Polgar finishes up her stint at ALAA this week. The ALAA Board of Directors is beginning the search for a new ED. Interested parties may submit r�sum�s to: Executive Director Search, ALAA, PO Box 2577, Austin, TX 78768.
And ALAA may not be the last arts service organization to lose its executive director this summer. Another change is in the wind, but since it could not be confirmed by press time, it’ll have to wait for a future column.
In the meantime, I’m pleased to note that not all the current personnel changes on the local arts scene are departures. At Frontera@Hyde Park Theatre, there’s a new body filling an old vacancy. For what feels like longer than F@HPT has been in existence, we’ve been reporting on this daredevil theatre company’s search for a managing director. They had one, then they didn’t, then they were searching, then they had one but lost her, then they were searching again, and searching and searching … Well, the search has ended, and the company is crowing over the addition of Julie Mann to the F@HPT team. Mann comes to Austin from the Theatre Big Time, New York City, where she has spent the past five years working in both nonprofit and commercial theatre. In addition to a two-year stint as assistant to the artistic director of the Women’s Project, Mann has served as management assistant on the productions of How I Learned to Drive, The Hairy Ape, and A Delicate Balance, and company manager for A View From the Bridge and this year’s Pulitzer Prize winner for Drama, Wit. Welcome, Julie!
And while it’s stretching it to call this change local, we feel compelled to note the latest addition to the University of Houston School of Theatre faculty. Sir Peter Hall, the celebrated theatre director and founder of Britain’s Royal Shakespeare Company, will take the Lyndall F. Wortham Performing Arts Chair left vacant by the death this past February of director Jose Quintero. Hall will be teaching courses on Shakespeare and directing.
This article appears in July 30 • 1999 and July 30 • 1999 (Cover).