“This is neither the time nor the place, Andrea,” Frost answered. “Let’s get upstairs to the Board meeting. I have a feeling it’s going to be interesting.”
BOARD MEETING
2
The unknowing might think that NatBallet’s Board of Directors, as the governing body of one of America’s leading cultural institutions, would meet in comfortable, rarefied and beautifully furnished surroundings. The reality was quite different. The Board met in a cramped, oblong room in the Zacklin Theatre, two floors above the stage and on the same level as the principal rehearsal studio.
Today there were twenty-six members of the Board (out of a total of thirty-five) present for the spring meeting. As they filed into the room after Clifton Holt’s disastrous rehearsal, they seated themselves on wooden funeral-parlor chairs arranged around four portable metal tables, pushed together in a long rectangle. Although new, the room was narrow and windowless; there was no aura of corporate grandeur, no echoes of J. P. Morgan or John D. Rockefeller, let alone Otto Kahn or Mrs. Belmont.
The room and its arrangements—the hard wooden chairs, the bare gray tables, the legal pads and pencils and the collection of duplicated materials distributed at each place—made a statement. The statement said: Yes, we will provide you with a seat, a sharpened pencil and a pad (one each), and a certain amount of information about NatBallet (the duplicated material). But don’t expect food or drink, or comfort that would make you want to linger. In other words, we welcome you, but don’t stay too long (and don’t get too deeply involved in our affairs). The ambience was closer to that of a criminal-court jury room than to that of the Cabinet Room at the White House.
The unknowing might also think that the purpose of this Board of Directors was to give patrician, thoughtful artistic advice to Clifton Holt and his colleagues. Such was not the case. The Board did, as it would today, go through the motions of ratifying decisions made by Holt about promotions in the Company. And if anything happened to Holt, the Board would appoint a new Director. But as long as Holt was in place, the artistic operations of the Company—the aspects of the Company’s existence that were seen by the public—were almost entirely his responsibility.
Although never spoken too loudly, the central purpose of the Board was to raise money, to find the wherewithal to pay dancers and musicians and stagehands and wardrobe mistresses a living wage, to provide money for scenery and costumes, and to buy roughly thirty thousand pairs of ballet slippers each season (at $25 a pair). And all without raising ticket prices to a level that would make admission to Nat-Ballet performances affordable only by arbitrageurs and rock promoters.
Other companies over the years had made the mistake of allowing board members to make artistic decisions; with the rarest exceptions, these attempts had been disastrous. The directors could, and did, express their opinions—often in very strong terms—to Holt. And the financial reins held by the Board imposed practical limits on what he could do. But Holt, shrewd enough to recognize the budgetary limits—which were lenient as such things went—had never had a serious dispute over money with the Board. Its members, in turn, had never overruled his artistic policies and judgments.
Some cynics might have said that the Board was deliberately inflated in size to reduce its decision-making efficiency. Other cynics (and they were right) realized that the larger the Board, the greater the contributions that could be exacted from its members. The unspoken rule was that each director was responsible for donating or personally raising at least $25,000 a year. Of course appropriate exceptions were made. Monsignor Joseph Carroll, the president of a local Catholic university, was excused. So was Bartlett Empson, a gentleman, a snob, an encyclopedic source of information about ballet history and an astute critic—and an aging bachelor of modest means. But most of the others had large bank balances, or their spouses did, or their fathers did, or the foundations they headed did. Or failing direct access to wealth themselves, they were sufficiently well connected with the rich to make them effective fund-raisers.
The fact that most Board members were rich or regularly associated with the rich did not necessarily make them genteel and couth. Mrs. Turnbull was not. Nor was Hugh Warner, whose real estate enterprises were under the protection of the bankruptcy court much of the time (though this did not seem to affect his personal generosity toward Nat-Ballet). Nor was Kenneth Franklin, a wealthy Wall Street commodities broker whose political contributions had enabled him to serve as an American ambassador in Europe, whence he had returned as (forevermore) Ambassador Franklin, though diplomatic he was not.
Privately, Reuben Frost was particularly contemptuous of Franklin. He regarded him as a vulgarian, a man singlemindedly devoted to making money and one whose pretensions as “the Ambassador” in no way masked his avarice and lack of taste and intellectual polish. Frost conceded that taste and intellect were probably not necessary in the commodities business, but thought they would have been useful to Franklin in his pose as a devoted patron of the arts. Pushed by his second wife, a former stewardess with pretensions even grander than her husband’s, Franklin had feigned sufficient interest in the dance to be named to the NatBallet Board. (His feigned interest, needless to say, being bolstered by frequent and generous contributions.)
Franklin was at Reuben’s side when he entered the meeting room. “That Maywood is quite a spitfire, isn’t she?” Franklin said to Frost. “What did she say to old Cliff—‘Mexican-jumping-bean music’?”
“Something like that,” Frost coolly replied.
Franklin seemed quite amused at the piece of living theatre he had just seen downstairs in the Zacklin auditorium. None of his colleagues shared his amusement, appalled as they were by Maywood’s behavior (if they were especially fond of Holt) or Holt’s (if their loyalties were with the ballerina) or the behavior of both (if they were objective about the matter and concerned above all about the Company).
In general, the assembling group was a subdued one. Monsignor Carroll, more used, as a former pastor, to scenes of grief and disaster than most, tried to cheer up Adelaide Simms and David Weiss, the elegant designer of equally elegant women’s clothes, by an insistent conversation about the City’s erratic spring weather.
Others were glum and silent, including Jack Navikoff, a blond, deeply tanned overgrown beachboy of fifty-odd. Navikoff had been the producer of Holt’s last three movies and in the process had become Holt’s close friend and confidant (and, more than likely, his lover). Holt by choice did not serve on the NatBallet Board—not out of any sense of artistic purity, but because its proceedings quite frankly bored him. Instead Navikoff had been named as a director at Holt’s insistence.
Those within Navikoff’s hearing did not overtly criticize Holt for his part in the set-to with the Company’s leading ballerina. For they had learned from experience that Navikoff was not only Holt’s mouthpiece, but his eyes and ears as well. Only Andrea Turnbull, extending the tirade she had started with Frost downstairs in the orchestra of the theatre, continued to broadcast her negative views of the Company’s Artistic Director.
“I think Clifton is around the bend,” she said to Hugh Warner. “Veronica Maywood was absolutely right. He is trying to do the impossible with that crazy Chávez music. And I am paying for it!” she said loudly, leaning into Warner’s face.
“Well, I agree with you that it all seems terribly messy,” Warner replied in his oleaginous baritone. “But she said herself the steps weren’t difficult. I think she feels threatened by Clifton’s interest in Laura.”
“Perhaps, though I don’t think Veronica is like that,” Turn-bull replied, with some petulance. “But if his stupid ballet—my ballet—ever sees the light of day, it will be very good for Roy. He is twice the dancer that Aaron is.”
“To each his own, Andrea,” Warner answered. “Time will tell.”
Frost, overhearing the conversation, marveled at Warner’s highly perceptive judgment, so aptly expressed in cliché. But it was time for business, and Fr
ost took his customary seat at the head of the table. On his left was Jeanine Saperstein, a culture maven whose aggressive energy had battered down the doors of several artistic institutions in the City—doors that in many cases would probably have been closed to one of such acutely deficient intellect, but for her brassiness and shamelessness. (There were some limits to what money could buy, and Ms. Saperstein, possessor of the proceeds of a large and messy divorce settlement that had permitted Mr. Saperstein to marry a pretty, young, intelligent—and quiet—museum assistant, came perilously close to them.)
The woman was the nominal secretary of the Board and, at each meeting, read the minutes in dramatic tones more suggestive of a bad tragedienne than of an efficient secretary. Next to her was Jocelyn Taylor, a bright young Smith graduate, passionate balletomane, and all-purpose Girl Friday on NatBallet’s staff, who actually kept the minutes and wrote them up after each meeting. (This was a task quite beyond Ms. Saperstein’s capabilities. As Cynthia Frost had once observed to Reuben, Jeanine had clearly been told by her mother before she started school that she must participate in each of her classes—that is, make herself heard even if she had nothing to say. This habit from school had continued into later life and was evident at the numerous board and committee meetings she now attended; she still raised her hand and talked whether or not her contributions were pertinent. Framing her words—one could not really say framing her thoughts—and seeking attention from the “Chair,” as she trendily called Reuben, would have left little time for taking minutes.)
At Frost’s right was David Weiss, Vice Chairman of the Board. A multimillionaire from his successful career as a high-fashion couturier—and perfume seller, jeans maker and (most recently) men’s designer—Weiss was a handsome, asexual (as far as anyone knew or could speculate) and utterly charming man. He was particularly useful in beguiling the latest Texas millionaire who had discovered the “bal-lay,” or the Upstate Assemblyman responsible for NatBallet’s New York State Council on the Arts’ appropriation—or more particularly, in beguiling their wives who (in the case of Mrs. Texas) wore his dresses or (in the case of Mrs. Assemblyman) had seen pictures of them.
Next to Weiss was Peter Howard, a young man of thirty-two, pleasant enough to be with once one recognized that he had a very low energy level. He purported to do some sort of teaching at the New School—closer investigation would have revealed that it was a rather basic night-school course in “the contemporary novel”—and otherwise appeared to devote his time to NatBallet. He served on the Board at his mother’s request, his mother being a wealthy grain heiress so generous in her many benefactions that she herself could not with any efficiency serve on the boards of all the charities to which she bountifully contributed. Peter’s amiability and reasonable intelligence had been spotted early. He had been offered the presidency of NatBallet three years earlier and had accepted, on condition that his duties would be only part-time. Within this constraint, he was good value for the Company. Well liked by the dancers, he acted as an ombudsman between the dancers and Holt, and also between the dancers and the business side of the operation. He held “open door” office hours twice a week, and listened patiently to the real or imagined grievances of the dancers, musicians and other personnel who stopped by to see him. He appeared to enjoy his job as President and, were he willing to spend a trifle more time and a bit more energy in carrying out his duties, would have been a truly effective figure not only in terms of the Company but also in the world of the arts generally.
“The meeting will please come to order,” Frost called out as the group sat down. “Jeanine, will you read the minutes from the January meeting?”
The January meeting had been most routine, but Ms. Saperstein, reading Jocelyn Taylor’s crisp minutes, managed to raise and lower her voice dramatically and endow the description of the proceedings with false suspense, a little like Joan Sutherland singing “Three Blind Mice.”
A motion to approve the minutes was carried, and Frost called on Ambassador Franklin to give the treasurer’s report. The Company was on budget, he reported, taking the group through the duplicated financial materials that had been distributed. Everyone knew that the extra rehearsal costs for Chávez Concerto, not yet reflected in the books, would probably change that; but box-office receipts were ahead of last year’s, as were donations. So a spirit of modest well-being pervaded the room as the meeting proceeded.
Frost took advantage of this mood to move quickly to the next item on the agenda, which he knew would be controversial: the question of promoting three of the Company’s dancers. He called on Navikoff to make a report. (Since suggestions for promotions by tradition originated only with Holt—the Board was involved really only because of the increased salary commitments the promotions made necessary—it had seemed appropriate to name Navikoff the chairman of the promotions committee, since he was most privy to Holt’s thinking on such matters.)
“Yes, Reuben, I’m happy to report,” Navikoff said. Frost, who considered himself quite expert on the subject, was sure that Navikoff normally wore contact lenses; to him the man’s not-quite-right turning of the head and slight hesitation in focusing were giveaways. Now, however, Navikoff was wearing outsize shell-rimmed glasses. Did the glasses contain real prescription lenses, Frost wondered, or were they simply a prop to enhance Navikoff’s “serious” (that is, non–pretty-boy) side? Frost did not know the answer, but he had a strong suspicion that the glasses were fake.
“As you all know,” Navikoff began, “it is customary to make promotions from the corps to soloist at this time of year and to make promotions to principal as well. I’ve talked with Clifton about this, and to Arne Petersen, the Assistant Artistic Director. Grace Russell, who’s on my committee, and Bartlett Empson, who is too, have also talked to them. And on this basis, we are prepared to recommend making Hailey Coles and Nancy Baker soloists and Aaron Cassidy a principal.
“Just to talk about them for a minute,” Navikoff continued. “Hailey is a charmer, as I think everyone here will agree. She’s only eighteen, but she’s been in the Company for two years now and she’s danced wonderfully everything that’s come her way, including the Sugar-Plum in Nutcracker. I understand she’s also rehearsing the lead role in Paganini Variations. Everyone thinks she’s great—long-legged, pretty and capable of both a seamless adagio and incredible speed. Don’t you agree, Bartlett?”
“Absolutely,” Empson answered. “She’s got a way to go, of course, at her young age. But she reminds me of the young Patty McBride. Able to do just about anything, and with real spirit. She’s going to go far. So is Nancy Baker, for that matter,” said Empson, preempting Navikoff’s report. “She’s extraordinary in Clifton’s Cinderella and that Chopin piano ballet. I don’t like that one very much, but she’s been able to make something of the young girl’s part for the first time ever. You remember even Veronica never looked very good in it.”
“Thank you, Bartlett,” Navikoff went on. “I guess that brings us to Aaron Cassidy. We now have sixteen principal dancers, though if you leave out Roberta and Sam, who are all but retired, it’s only fourteen who are active. That’s a low number—we had eighteen, remember, two years ago. Clifton feels very strongly that Aaron is ready. He’s tall, and he’s a wonderful partner, and he’s just what the Company needs. The ballerinas can only look good if they have good partners—and Aaron can make them look good.”
“Does anyone have any comments?” Frost asked the group. Andrea Turnbull put up her hand at once and Frost called on her.
“I don’t have any quarrel with the girls,” she said. “They seem all right to me. But I’ve said over and over again to anyone who would listen that Aaron Cassidy is simply not a first-class dancer. Handsome he is—very handsome. And that goes a long way with some,” she continued, pointedly. “But technically he is not up to being a principal dancer—or at least, that’s my judgment. Doesn’t anyone agree?” She looked around the table plaintively.
“Andrea, there
is no question that Aaron is not the finest dancer we have,” Empson said. “But I’m sure he’s going to get better. Don’t forget he didn’t go to our school, and he has a lot of little mannerisms that he has to unlearn. He’s got to learn to hold his shoulders correctly, for one thing. But that’s easy, and I certainly have no objection to promoting him now.”
“Anyone else?” Frost asked.
“If Clifton wants him, let him have him,” said Kenneth Franklin.
“I agree,” said Jeanine Saperstein. “When one’s time has come, one’s time has come. We have to recognize it.”
Frost ignored the secretary’s inanity. “Do I take it, then, that all three appointments should be made? Or should we vote on them separately?”
“I move that we accept all three recommendations,” David Weiss said, with Monsignor Carroll offering a quick second.
Frost took a formal vote by a show of hands. It was unanimous, except for Andrea Turnbull, who sat sullenly at her end of the table and refused to vote either aye or nay.
“Very well,” Frost said. “Will you let Clifton know, Jack? I assume he’ll want to convey the good news right away.”
“Yes, indeed,” Navikoff replied.
“Mr. Chairman, can I ask a question?” Adelaide Simms called out from the other end of the room.
“What is it, Adelaide?” Frost asked.
“I think the appointments we’ve just approved are fine,” Simms began. “Aaron, Hailey and Nancy will all, I’m sure, do credit to the Company. But I’m troubled by one thing, Mr. Navikoff, and that’s the failure to promote Gerald Hazard. He became a soloist what—ten years ago? And I really don’t understand why he’s not promoted to principal. My own opinion is that he is one of the finest we have—he’s elegant, his technique is impeccable and it appears that he can do anything. I remember one night last season when he did the Bournonville variations, Clifton’s Jazz Café and the Corsaire pas de deux all in one evening. So just what is his status?”
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