WPCNR STAGE DOOR. By John F. Bailey. February 16, 2006, UPDATED 1:20 P.M. E.S.T. : Kelli Carpenter O’Donnell, partner of television icon, Rosie O’Donnell, stood dramatically and offered $5 Million for the Helen Hayes Theatre last night.
Kelli Carpenter O’Donnell’s show-stopping moment came at the conclusion of the Public Forum held byThe Board of Directors of The Helen Hayes Theatre Company in the Theatre on Main Street in Nyack, to discuss their pending deal with Milbrook Partners of Manhasset to sell the theatre for $3.7 Million and seek proposals to fund the theatre’s continued operation. The two-and-a-half hour meeting produced three offers to purchase the theatre building for more than Milbrook Partners had agreed to pay for the building in a privately placed deal by the Board of Directors.
I’ll Buy It! Kelli Carpenter O’Donnell Offers $5 Million for Helen Hayes Theatre. Photo, WPCNR StageCam
The Board of Directors of Helen Hayes Theatre Company Getting a Bad Review from over 200 persons in the Helen Hayes Theatre Wednesday evening. It was a passionate drama, filled with fury, invective, insults, from the Board to the audience and members of the audience to the Board. Audience members blamed the Board for not coming to them. The Board blamed the audience for lack of support of the theater. At one point the audience was asked for a show of hands of who were season subscribers. Only 5 or 6 hands were raised. A Board member indicated this was why the theatre was in this siutation. An audience member shouted it was because of “lousy programs.” Photo, WPCNR StageCam.
Kelli O’Donnell lives with her partner Rosie O’Donnell in Pretty Penny the home formerly occupied by Helen Hayes, the theatre’s namesake and legend of Broadway. Ms. Carpenter-O’Donnell stood at the close of the acrimonious 2-1/2 hour meeting and said she would buy the theater outright for $5 Million.
The Board & Management Must Go
Ms. O’Donnell said she and Rosie had only learned about the sale a week ago, and had she and her partner known about the theatre was up for sale she “would have been down with a $5 Million check the next day,” which would have beaten the privately negotiated placement offer of Milbrook Partners by over a million dollars.
Kelli O’Donnell told WPCNR she would only purchase the theatre now if the present Board of Directors and management resigned after her purchase.
Ms. O’Donnell, when asked if she would give the $5 Million to grubstake the theatre and start up its operation, without ownership, said she would not. Asked if she and her partner were considering legal action to stay the impending closing on the property, O’Donnell said she was writing the Attorney General a letter. The Attorney General’s office approved the sale January 19 and the Rockland County Court approved the petition of sale January 24, and through a spokesperson told WPCNR the approval was being reviewed.
Beats Private Placement Deal
Laura Weiss, a member of the Board of Directors said she negotiated the Milbrook deal and prepared the reported 300-page contract pro bono. She reported she personally brought in Milbrook very quickly when the theatre needed money (because she knew them), when the theatre was faced with a $275,000 debt they had to pay, (that was negotiated down from $500,000 by Joseph Lagana, the President of the Board of Directors). Weiss said it was either the timely deal then or go into bankruptcy.
The Board repeatedly said they did not have time to offer the property on the open market in response to audience criticism that they did not put the property on the open market.
10 Days to Save the Theatre
Mr. Lagana speaking for the Board of Directors gave the public an ultimatum that the Board would entertain proposals from the community to save the theatre. Lagana said the public had 10 days to submit such proposals, which Lagana and Daniel Rodriguez, another member of the Board, emphasized had to be money-based in order to meet the rent and budget (estimated by Lagagna as being at least $700,000 to reopen the theatre).
Walter LeCroy of the Board told WPCNR afterwards he would be resigning from the Board of Directors “after the transition.”
LeCroy confirmed to the CitizeNetReporter that prior to the vote to accept the Milbrook offer, other members of the Board who had not been attending Board of Directors meetings had been determined to have “resigned,” by the six member Board that voted, because LeCroy said the Helen Hayes bylaws state that if a director missed two meetings, he or she had, in effect, “resigned.”
Lagana also told the CitizeNetReporter, he would be resigning after the “transition.”
The audience of 200 persons had been roasting and toasting the Board of Directors all evening for having not involved the community, and repeatedly launched pointed questions as to why the property was not offered to the community and put on the open market. Harriet Cornell, Chair of the Rockland County Board of Legislators, disputed the Board’s charge the community and the county had not stepped up to support the theatre in its hour of need, saying the Helen Hayes received the highest amount of arts funding from Rockland County.
Laura Weiss said the Board went to the private placement because Milbrook Properties stepped in in a timely manner when notified by Ms. Weiss of the Helen Hayes Theatre plight. Ms. Weiss stated she had contacted Milbrook to see if they would buy the theatre to pay off the debt because she knew the firm from past legal work she had executed for that organization. It was also revealed during the course of the evening that the $700,000 downpayment by Milbrook on the pending sale was in the form of a mortgage.
White Plains Pullout a Factor?
The sudden financial crisis may have been precipitated in part, WPCNR has learned previously, because of the White Plains Performing Arts Center choosing to terminate its relationship with Helen Hayes Theatre Company, in November, when the White Plains group found how much money the WPPAC was pumping into Helen Hayes Theatre for two-and-a-half years (reported to them to be $500,000 a year, $900,000 over 2-1/2 years).
WPPAC is reported as having paid about half the Helen Hayes payroll by paying the salaries of Helen Hayes employees doing work for the White Plains Performing Arts Center.
Lagana informed the audience at Helen Hayes that he had personally lent $200,000 so Helen Hayes could meet its payroll the timing apparently was in November, after White Plains Performing Arts Center had severed its relationship with Helen Hayes.
Money Maneuvers (Update)
Last week, an informed source told WPCNR that the White Plains Performing Arts Center had severed its agreement with Helen Hayes in mid-November, when it “settled up” with Helen Hayes on what was owed in salaries, and presently the source said there is no money owed, no litigation, no money owed. “We settled up with them. They paid what they owed us,” but the source did not elaborate nor disclose the amount of the settlement.
A source on the White Plains Performing Arts Center Board of Directors, Bruce Berg, told WPCNR recently that of the $100,000 Louis Cappelli contributed to WPPAC in late November (when WPPAC severed relations) went to paying WPPAC debt, and most of it went to paying expenses for Saving Aimee, the ill-fated $375,000 production that played the WPPAC in October. Berg also said that $50,000 additional dollars had been raised by Mr. Cappelli and contributed to WPPAC, and that he was raising $50,000 more. It could not be confirmed by WPCNR on the record last night what dollar amount White Plains Performing Arts Center paid Helen Hayes as part of the “settle up.”
It will be recalled by WPCNR readers, that the $100,000 the Common Council authorized to be budgeted to the WPPAC November 27, voted upon at the December Common Council meeting is being used to fund WPPAC operations for the spring season on a “draw-down” basis, according to the source confirming the Helen Hayes settlement.
Tony Stimac told WPCNR in the lobby of the Helen Hayes last night the number of employees shared with White Plains Performing Arts Center was 7, and that he did not remember how much the 7 were costing WPPAC annually.
Lagana, Rodriquez Ask for Proposals with Money to run the Theatre.
Joseph Lagana, the President of the Board of Directors and Laura Weiss, the lawyer who handled the Milbrook sale, said on numerous occasions during the night they would honor the contract with Milbrook Partners, indicating it was a done deal and they could not back out on the commitment.
A closing on the $3.7 Million deal was expected in March, Weiss said. When asked if the Board would suspend the deal to seek other offers that were made from the floor, both Lagana and Weiss were adamant they would honor the contract. Though when Ms. Carpenter-O’Donnell made her offer, Mr. Lagana appeared stunned.
$700,000 and up.
Lagana said the evening’s forum was to seek proposals from the audience for running the theatre after the sale. He said a minimum of $700,000 was needed to reopen Helen Hayes Theatre Company after the sale takes place. Weiss said there was a rider in the contract that gave Helen Hayes about 30 days after the closing to decide if they would continue to run the theatre and pay the rent to the new owners should they complete the contract.
A “forensic accountant,” Gary Kahn, representing Milbrook Properties, after it was revealed by a member of the Nyack Board of Trustees that rent for Helen Hayes Theatre would be $36,950 a month according to the Milbrook-Helen Hayes contract, said his company would be willing to reduce that rent to $18,000 a month, which is what the theatre paid the previous owner, according to Mr. Stimac.
Asked by the CitizeNetReporter if Milbrook would be willing to sell the theater portion of the building as a condonimium to a prospective buyer, Kahn, the accountant, said he couldn’t answer that question, but that the company “was willing to do whatever it could to save the theatre.”
Just such a deal, a “condo-out” was created by the City of White Plains where the City of White Plains purchased the WPPAC space built in the City Center as a condominium from Cappelli Enterprises.
Stimac Being Paid by WPPAC, working free for Helen Hayes during Transition.
Tony Stimac, speaking to WPCNR at the close of the meeting revealed he was still helping with the transition of Helen Hayes Theatre Company during the sale, but was not getting paid by Helen Hayes any more.
Stimac is being paid approximately $75,000 a year by White Plains Performing Arts Center (according to the Center’s 2003-2004 Form 990, to prepare and direct a new WPPAC production of Julius Ceasar with non-equity actors for presentation at the White Plains Performing Arts Center.
He is simultaneously preparing for the gala fund raiser for WPPAC, The Three Phantoms on March 20, however no prices have been listed for Phantoms, in the most recent brochure announcing the Spring season. No invitations have been known to have been sent out to White Plains deep pockets.
