The MacNeil/Lehrer Report; Radio City Music Hall

JIM LEHRER: Radio City Music Hall in New York City. It`s an American institution gone broke and going under. Does it deserve to be saved with taxpayers` money? Is the Radio City Music Hall art?

(Opening music.)

LEHRER: Good evening. Seven years ago my wife and I took our three children on a family trip from Texas to New York City. It was their first trip to New York, and the first thing that we did was go to Radio City Music Hall. The movie was, "Plaza Suite," with Walter Matthau; the stage show was 1940s gaudy, with the Rockettes, and a good time was had by all. But for tourists like us and others, that kind of Radio City Music Hall experience may soon be a thing of the past. It`s scheduled to close April 12th. The giant art deco theater isn`t making it financially any more.

A move is afoot to save it though, and like most afoot moves, there`s a controversy about it because, in addition to suggestions that it be turned into a gambling casino, or a media center, or a rock concert hall, there`s also been the proposal that state and federal cultural funds be used to rescue it, as is. Tonight, nostalgia aside, do the "G" movies, the Rockettes, and the place itself constitute art, the kind of art that deserves to be preserved with public funds? Robert MacNeil is off; Charlayne Hunter-Gault is in New York. Charlayne?

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Jim, Radio City Music Hall has always been measured in superlatives, ever since it opened its doors forty-five years ago, in the middle of the depression, and billed itself as the largest temple of entertainment in the world. Everything about Radio City Music Hall is big, from the long lines outside, to the sixty-two-hundred-seat auditorium inside. The stage is almost big enough for a football game. Over the years, some 250 million visitors have flocked to see movies and a stage show that ranks as one of the biggest and best entertainment bargains anywhere. The theater opened as a vaudeville house, with headliners such as Ray Bolger, Weber & Fields, Jan Peerce and Martha Graham. Two weeks after opening night, movies were added, a practice that has never changed. In the heyday of the movie palaces, the best acts in town played at Radio City, including Gypsy Rose Lee. Aside from her appearance, the Music Hall has always stood for family entertainment, and lately that has been one of the problems: finding enough movies the whole family could see together. Today, Radio City is the only surviving example of the giant motion picture palaces. Gone are the Roxy, the Capitol, and the Paramount. The Paramount featured all the great swing bands, and young singers like Frank Siantra. In the 40s, Sinatra had teenagers screaming in the aisles between picture shows. But styles and tastes change, and so do old theaters. The Paramount is now an office building. And back at the Music Hall, the Rockettes are still going strong, but the audiences are not. And that`s the problem. Jim?

LEHRER: The person spearheading the drive to save Radio City Music Hall now, is New York`s lieutenant governor, Mary Anne Krupsak. She`s organized a rescue committee, consisting of representatives of government, business, and cultural groups. Governor, first, when you and others say "rescue" Radio City Music Hall, what do you mean by rescue?

MARY ANNE KRUPSAK: Keep it operating as a center of cultural and performing arts, Jim.

LEHRER: Just like it is? With the same kind of movies, stage shows as now are performed there?

KRUPSAK: No. There`s a little misunderstanding on that score. Since the announcement by the management of Radio City that they were going to close their doors after the Easter show, I called a meeting in New York City, and asked people in various cultural fields, in other performing arts fields, impresarios and other interested citizens, to gather and just to begin to discuss other uses that would maintain the Radio City center as a place where the performing arts could find a home. Remember, it`s a six thousand seat auditorium; it is unique in the world, really, and it is in fine condition. Whether, in fact, films alone would sustain it, is a question that has not yet been resolved, and we`ll probably find that it can`t. But clearly, at least twice a year Radio City makes money; that`s the Easter show and the Christmas show, with the Rockettes and with a film presentation. Some of the ideas that are being discussed right now and will be presented to the management of Radio City include possibilities of keeping those two traditions going and finding other uses for Radio City during the rest of the year.

LEHRER: I see. Do you think that government funds, state or federal should be used to save Radio City Music Hall?

KRUPSAK: Let me make a very pointed remark here. New York State, and New York City particularly, has a tradition of preeminence in the field of the arts. In fact, our 42 billion dollars, closely approaching this year, our projections of a five billion dollar tourist industry...we know from a commission study by one of the leading advertising agencies in New York City, that forty-eight per cent of the people who come to New York and spend money in all the other fields -- the thirty-nine billion dollar retail trade field, the one billion dollar hotel industry, the four billion dollar restaurant industry -- come to New York because of the arts. So when we`re talking about the almost insignificant, but nevertheless critical piece that the state government plays in terms of an appropriation, a subsidy, if you will ... ten per cent of some of the major institutions, Lincoln Center for example, the Metropolitan Museum Of Art, Museum of Modern Art, places like that-that is returned so many times over in the money that`s spent in this area and the jobs that are generated.

LEHRER: You feel that Radio City Music Hall is in the same category as those institutions you just named?

KRUPSAK:I think so. For lots of reasons. Outstanding world renowned critics in architecture, most recently Jack Kroll`s article in Newsweek, pointed out that the art deco style of the architecture is an historic landmark just and in itself. Right now, there are hearings that are about to be held in New York City to establish that place as a New York City landmark. Similarly, at the federal level, we are requesting that the National Historic Register take a look at the art deco architecture. So you know, if we start with the basic premise Jim, and get beyond the point where man lives by more than bread alone, and understand the importance to the spirit and to the quality of life, then we want to maintain and support an historical presence in our nation of those very, very special things, and Radio City is one of them.

LEHRER: Let me read to you a quote from New York Times` columnist, William Safire about this. He says he finds it, quote, "incredible the notion that modern non-moviegoers should be forced to support with taxes, what they refuse to support by buying tickets."

KRUPSAK:I don`t happen to agree with Mr. Sapphire. I suppose if people who don`t ride trains want to make an issue of the fact that we subsidize railroads; or people who don`t ride subways might recognize there are government subsidies to provide mass transit because we simply need it in our kind of civilized society; if we take a look at whether we approve of things like supporting the existence of a major company like Lockheed, or other uses of public money; if we don`t like wars and we present defense budgets that use that money -- we can make an argument about a lot of things. The fact is, that what we`re talking about is not a total subsidy. We`re talking about a piece of the income that would be used to generate jobs, to continue the presence of an industry in New York that is just one of its major economic lifeblood`s. And we`re talking about a specific place. I couldn`t make the same argument for every neighborhood theater. I could give you chapter and verse of the difference in whole areas, in whole districts, by the presence of the arts. If we have time to get into that, I will. What`s happened in the Soho district in New York, for example. It used to be a deserted place at night, with only luncheonettes in the afternoon. Suddenly it`s an attractive place for art and artists and now we have real estate values going up, more income coming into the city, and a whole life style that is being generated because of the arts.

LEHRER: I take your point, Governor. Thank you.

KRUPSAK: Thank you, Jim.

LEHRER: Charlayne?

HUNTER-GAULT: One of Broadway`s most successful producers is Joseph Papp, whose current hits include, A Chorus Line and For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide. Last year, e pulled his popular Shakespeare festival out o Lincoln Center`s Vivian Beaumont Theater, and resigned as producer/director there, partly because of the difficulty of raising funds to get the Beaumont out of the red. Mr. Papp, what do you think the similarities might be between the Beaumont and Radio City? Aren`t they both sort of white elephants?

JOSEPH PAPP: I like white elephants.

HUNTER-GAULT: Well, are there similarities in these two white elephants?

PAPP: Not exactly. Radio City has always operated as a commercial operation; in other words, Radio City was created to make a profit. The Beaumont was never created to make a profit. It`s an arts institution, and generally the kind of plays that were done there, in the same way that the kind of music that`s played at the Philharmonic, or the kind of operas that are at the Met, even though you play to one hundred per cent capacity, you still, because of the largeness of the institution and the costs involved, you can`t possibly make a profit...in the same way the White House doesn`t expect to make a profit on rent there at the White House. But Radio City should be saved for its architectural purposes alone, just to begin with. It`s a great building, and the city needs great buildings. It should be saved by the government, which has spent billions of dollars on a lot of things that destroy. I don`t think they should aid and abet the destruction of really a very important landmark of the 30s.

HUNTER-GAULT: Well, what do you think it should be saved for?

PAPP: It should be saved for the time when we begin to really understand what to do with it. Right now, nobody really knows. And there are some suggestions going back and forth, but we shouldn`t proceed with the execution until some good thinking goes into it. There are many ways. One could say that it should be operating on a profit basis, that it`s necessary to do that; and some people think it`s possible. Some people feel that the management of Radio City is still living in the 30s and 40s, and that there are other ways to accumulate profits and to make it operable. I don`t think the building should be altered in any particular way. It`s very difficult to use a 6,000-seat facility. It`s a huge, huge facility. The largest theatrical house in New York is somewhere around three thousand seats, and that requires a huge hit to make it operable. But I think it would be a mistake, as we`ve made mistake after mistake by destroying the Metropolitan Opera, which was an extraordinary institution, and I know it costs money to do that, but we spend money on lots of things. We shouldn`t spend money, I don`t think at this moment, in terms of operating the building, until we know exactly how to operate it.

HUNTER-GAULT: So you`re saying that the government should come in on just a temporary basis, just to either maintain the building or keep the doors open, until somebody, maybe the rescue committee, could determine what to do with it.

PAPP: That`s right. I think time is needed to really analyze the usage of the place. In the meantime, though, I think it`s incumbent upon the government to prevent the destruction of this very important piece of architecture.

HUNTER- GAULT: Is it art?

PAPP: Is what art? The architecture?

HUNTER-GAULT: Yes, the architecture, and what comes out of it.

PAPP: I`m trying to separate the two things. Some of the things that happen at Radio City could be considered a kind of art; I mean the Rockettes are a kind of art. We`re not condescending and not superior about the Rockettes. They`re a marvelous institution; and some of the performers are excellent performers. And the people come and enjoy themselves. Who`s to say La Forza del Destino is more important than Singing in the Rain? That`s snobbery, you now.

HUNTER-GAULT: Thank you. We`ll get back to a little more discussion of the Rockettes in a few minutes. Jim?

LEHRER: All right. The major vehicle for spending the federal government`s cultural money is the National Endowment for the Arts. In its twelve years in business, the Endowment has dispensed some 337 million dollars to individuals, institutions and groups in the arts. David Searles is the Endowment`s senior deputy chairman for policy and planning. Before going with the Endowment, he was deputy director of the Peace Corps. First, Mr. Searles, is there anything the Endowment can do to help bail out Radio City Music Hall?

P. DAVID SEARLES: As Mr. Papp said a moment ago, Radio City Music Hall has always operated as a commercial enterprise, and the Endowment never has, and is precluded from providing support for commercial enterprises. Should that situation change, then I think it would be possible for a non-profit organization that is managing the Radio City Music Hall to apply to the Endowment, and perhaps this gets to Mr. Papp`s point of a moment ago, for a planning grant that would allow some time to bring the resources together to determine what other possible uses of this very fine facility exist for the future. The Endowment, unfortunately, only has a small amount of money nationally for this particular purpose, that is, providing planning grants for reuse of facilities that now exist. It`s something far less than a million dollars for the entire nation. So we could do a small part of it, but not very much of it.

LEHRER: I mean, there`s no way the federal government is going to keep Radio City Music Hall open under any circumstances, right, even if it goes through the non-profit transformation?

SEARLES: We would like to see the building preserved. It is a magnificent structure and it should remain in New York City in its present form. I don`t think that its present entertainment policy is one that we would support.

LEHRER: All right. Why not?

SEARLES: Basically, because the people of New York City and the surrounding areas, the hundreds of thousands of tourists who come, don`t seem to want it. That obviously popular appeal is not the thing the Endowment bases its decisions on, but in a situation where the six thousand seats are often filled only to twenty to thirty per cent capacity, I think there`s a message there.

LEHRER: And the message is what?

SEARLES: The message is: rethink the use of the space.

LEHRER: Do family movies and spectacular stage shows qualify as art, under the Endowment`s definition of arts?

SEARLES: I think it`s wrong for the federal governments, the National Endowment for the Arts, to try to say what art is.

LEHRER: But you have to don`t you, if you`re going to dispense money?

SEARLES: We can say what we dispense money for, and we say the programs we support are in support of the arts. There are many arts activities we would like to support that we don`t. We support those where we think our presence can make a difference, where our level of funding is essential to the success of the enterprise. There are many arts activities, many art forms that we don`t support. Just because we don`t support them, doesn`t mean that they aren`t art.

LEHRER: All right. Let me ask you this in specific terms: Has the National Endowment for the Arts ever granted money to any institution in the United States that shows movies and has entertainment similar to what is on the stage at Radio City Music Hall?

SEARLES: I can`t speak for the whole twelve-year history, but I would guess that the answer is, no we have not, though some of our recipient grantees may have, with non-Endowment funds, done some of these activities. I doubt if the Endowment has, in its history, supported that sort of activity.

LEHRER: All right. Let`s go back to you, Governor Krupsak. If you`re depending on the federal government, obviously, Mr. Searles and his friends don`t hold out much hope.

KRUPSAK: Jim, let me just make a point about this. We are talking fundamentally about a part of the budget being helped by some direct subsidies. I`ll give you a case in point. Last year, the New York State Council of the Arts, which is an organization that we`ve supported since 1965 in our state budget, made an appropriation of 625 thousand dollars to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. A marketing study, directly involved with asking tourists their habits once they attended that museum, indicated that the tourists who visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art spent, in New York, three million dollars a week. Now, we think that`s a darn good investment, if that little contribution helped to keep the doors open.

LEHRER: Sure. But let`s go to the point that Mr. Searles made, and I have the figures here, that back in the 40s, seven million people a year visited Radio City Music Hall. Last year, it was two million. And the point Mr. Searles is making is that if it`s twenty or thirty per cent occupied, obviously the public is not interested in what is showing there. So why support it?

KRUPSAK: One of the things that the group of people who are gathering around and discussing the ideas about uses, and also discussing with people who are producers and who bring cultural events ... we`re coming to the point that perhaps it can`t sustain motion pictures and the type of entertainment that is there now. But what we are looking at are alternate uses. Right now, some of the weeks of the year are spent for rock festivals and other such events. The management may very well have to make a decision to go in the direction of other cultural events there in performing arts. And I don`t think anybody`s disagreeing with that. I like the idea of what I`ve just heard from Mr. Searles in discussing the possibility that if the management agrees to go not for profit, and we can make that transfer, and we can create the vehicle for doing that. We have some funds available out of a state program that aids business -- and this is business -- to get them by with a bridge loan until such time that a good group of people, such as Mr. Papp talked about, and others who would come forward, could help to design a year-round proposition, a program that would be attractive to the people who attend and who are the mainstay of our cultural industry.

LEHRER: Let me ask Mr. Papp a question. On this point that Mr. Searles made, which is basically that Radio City Music Hall operates at a twenty or thirty per cent capacity and thus, it`s questionable whether public funds should be used to support that kind of enterprise ... does that fall into your criteria for how and when to support the arts?

PAPP: Not at all. There are many artistic institutions that are supported that don`t play to 100% capacity, or 90% capacity, or 50% capacity. And incidentally, there are many theaters in Europe that play to about 30% capacity and get eight or nine million dollars a year in subsidy. And two million people a year is not so bad, incidentally, that do attend, if not seven million. So I think the criteria of numbers should be eradicated from the discussion. I think the main problem is, can that place be operated at all, on any kind of basis. I don`t think that`s been determined yet. It needs a lot of examination. I`m just saying, save the building; don`t let the building go down.

LEHRER: Well, is anybody seriously suggesting that the building be torn down?

KRUPSAK: Yes.

PAPP: It`s a natural consequence of that. It`s very valuable real estate in that area. I think the management would like to build some office buildings there, which would be a horrendous thing to do. But they`ll try to make it into some kind of property that produces some revenue. But the building itself, I think is the key issue right now. The question of whether you can operate a 6,000-seat auditorium, to me, at this moment, is doubtful, to tell you the honest truth. If I were faced with that problem, I wouldn`t know what to do; and I think it`s a serious question. And perhaps in preserving the structure, something else entirely might have to be done, maybe something that is not necessarily entertainment. I don`t know.

LEHRER: So in other words, what you`re saying is, is that it`s an architectural question, not a performing arts question.

PAPP: At this moment, I feel it`s essentially an architectural question, and it has to do with what New York looks like, particularly at a time when New York is under some kind of devastation, when anything we save makes the City a better place to look at and to live in. There`s no question that it has to have some viability; it just can`t be some place that people just wander into and look at and pay fifty cents to see. It is a performing institution, but I think that`s the dilemma people are facing right now...is to how to operate a 6,000-seat place. And perhaps maybe I still even disagree with the notion that has been proposed that the Rockettes and certain of these things are not to be subsidized. The things that are not subsidized in this country in the arts, are generally things people are able to pay for, and want to pay for. Broadway, for example, is not subsidized, because people go up to the box office and pay for a ticket. The reason these other institutions are subsidized, like the Philharmonic and certain theaters, is that they can`t make their way under what we call normal competitive situations as far as profits are concerned because the nature of the material is such that it does not have a popular following. I think some way must be considered to deal with popular tastes as well.

LEHRER: Mr. Searles wanted to say something about that.

SEARLES: I wanted to talk about the part that it was only an architectural question. I think that puts it in the wrong position, because only architecture makes it sound as if it`s only bricks and mortar. A building like that building is far more than that: it`s an integral part of the city; it has an integral impact on the livability of that city; and the Arts Endowment and the federal government has, in recent years, recognized the crucial importance of protecting that kind of space, that kind of building. To describe it as only architectural is to miss the point of what that sort of space, that sort of building can mean to a city, and to a neighborhood within a city.

LEHRER: Charlyane?

HUNTER-GAULT: Governor Krupsak, would you like to speak to that point?

KRUPSAK: Just one, quick point. I think it`s clearly more than the architectural building, but what we`re talking about is buying time to have those who are already directed, and to be complemented by others, find the right use that would make it a viable, continuing operation in New York City.

HUNTER-GAULT: O.K. Just on that point, let me ask you, trying to focus Radio City in the context of other institutions in the City and elsewhere ...you will obviously need a massive effort in this regard. What about the other outlying institutions, community-based institutions, the trend toward mobile institutions that go to where people live rather than have people come to them? Doesn`t this kind of effort detract from that?

KRUPSAK: No. I think that these are not mutually exclusive by any means, Charlayne. I think that what we have here is a beautiful, historically important piece of architecture that houses, at least for a good part of the year, entertainment that is not yet viable.

HUNTER-GAULT: Not yet viable?

KRUPSAK. Yes, because at least twice a year it`s a money-making proposition: the Christmas season and the Easter season, when there are especially large numbers of families that come to New York with their children. I might point this out to you: since the announcement of our efforts, we have heard from people all over this country, sharing their own personal experiences, much the way Jim started by saying he brought his family. My very first introduction to live theater and performing arts, as a child growing up from a small, basically rural community in upstate New York, was coming to New York City to see the performing arts at Radio City. And the kind of popular taste that it generates is something we should not overlook, the fact that it provides that kind of entry for many people who become, ultimately, supporters and enjoyers and audiences for other forms of art.

HUNTER-GAULT: You talk about this large audience of people, including yourself and Jim and others, who have enjoyed Radio City. What about other options? What about private philanthropy? Let me ask you that, Mr. Papp. What do you think would be the response to private philanthropy?

PAPP: Well, the point is, that to operate that place on a yearly basis and just to deal with the deficit of the operation if it became non-profit, would be extraordinary. I estimate maybe six, eight million dollars a year. This is just off the top of my head. But it becomes a very expensive operation. People have been building a lot of buildings without knowing what to put in them, and so it has to be very carefully calculated. Let me say one more thing about architecture. The Coliseum is also architecture, and should be preserved.

LEHRER: Mr. Papp, thank you. Governor Krupsak, thank you, and good night Charlayne. Mr. Searles, thank you. Have a nice weekend. We`ll see you on Monday. I`m Jim Lehrer. Thank you, and good night.