New home for National Ballet of Canada? (News).

The National Ballet of Canada has announced that it is negotiating tenancy in the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, Toronto's proposed $67 million (U.S.), 2000-seat opera house, which is slated to open in the fall of 2005. The media release declaration follows several years of informal discussions between the National Ballet and the Canadian Opera Company, the new building's owner and spearhead of the capital drive.

The long fight to get an opera house in Toronto has been what Richard Bradshaw, general director of the COC, once called the "Thirty Years War." For the last forty-two years, both companies have been tenants in the cavernous 3,200-seat Hummingbird Centre, notorious for horrendous acoustics and lack of intimacy. Says Sue Matthews, chair of the ballet board, "We had to feel confident that the opera house was going to happen before we could publicly declare our interest."

While acknowledging the potential of the tenancy, NBC Artistic Director James Kudelka adds a note of caution: "The major boon is that we will be able to grow from sixty-nine to ninety performances, which will give the dancers more onstage opportunities, and the company is excited by that. A longer season, however, necessitates more dancers, so there are run-up costs in other areas. As well, there's a long history of ballet and opera companies not getting along well together in shared spaces because we function differently, but I hope we can make this work."

An interesting coincidence is that Kevin Garland, the new executive director of the ballet, is the former executive director of the COC Opera House Corporation. "Right from the early design stages," she says, "we consulted the ballet about basic needs like sprung floors, storage, and shoe rooms in order to create a building that could accommodate a dance company. For example, there were no plans in the original design for a dance studio to hold both class and rehearsals." Garland confirms that the tenancy will be based on a long-term lease of ten years or more, and that the ballet will be paying slightly less rent than the annual $640,000 it currently pays at the Hummingbird.

In 2000, the National Ballet conducted a needs-assessment-cum-business-plan on how it would be impacted by a smaller house and the loss of more than 1,000 seats, and this has become the point of departure for the negotiations. All parties, including the Canadian Opera Company's managing director, Rob Lamb, state that scheduling has been the most contentious issue. "There are only so many good weeks in the year," says Lamb, "and a great deal of compromise has had to take place on both sides. Nonetheless, we're thrilled to have the ballet involved, and we're working hard to adjust the interior to suit both our needs. There's a real spirit of collegiality."

Other sticking points in the arrangement include front-of-house issues such as box-office space and company boutiques, the makeup of the orchestra, governance of the board, development and fund-raising, sight lines, the backstage configuration, lounge space and corporate events, patron boxes, and shared services. Both companies are in close discussion with architect Jack Diamond to work through these issues.

Says Matthews: "While the two companies might have different aims and objectives for an ideal opera house, we both need each other, and that's the reality."