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The metro area is about to lose its only professional dance company. The Rose Theater announced Tuesday that it plans to discontinue its Omaha Theater Ballet and School at the end of the 2009-10 season.
The demise of the company, known for its annual production of “The Nutcracker,” means neither Nebraska nor Iowa will have a full-time professional dance company. Missouri's Kansas City Ballet will be the closest professional ballet company.
The decision will result in 14 lost jobs — 10 full-time professional dancers and four staffers. The ballet's season ends after the final production of “The Rainforest” on Feb. 21.
Parents of local ballet students and dance company supporters were stunned.
“The Rose didn't give us a chance to hold a fundraiser or do anything to save the ballet,” said Mary Theisen, whose daughter Laura, 11, attends the Rose ballet school.
Omahan Amy Trebbien, whose daughter, Emily, 12, studies at the school, said she was disappointed at how the ballet was treated.
“The loss of professional ballet will devalue our community,” she said.
Toby Schropp, the board president of the Rose Theater, said the Rose's revenue derived from contributions dropped by about $300,000 during the recession.
The Rose's entire annual budget is about $3.1 million.
“We are extremely proud of this ballet company and are saddened by the situation,” he said. “I want everyone to know this was purely an economic decision.”
The ballet company and school, which both fall under the managerial umbrella of the Rose, have an annual income of about $300,000 but expenses of $550,000. The decline in income from contributions left the Rose unable to afford subsidizing the ballet's losses, he said.
“Eliminating the ballet and school will put us on a sound financial footing,” said Schropp, who said the Rose now would concentrate on its core mission of children's theater.
The Rose, home to the third-largest children's theater in the country, isn't the only arts group in the region to struggle lately.
Both the Nebraska Shakespeare Festival and Opera Omaha shortened their seasons. The Omaha Symphony, arguably the region's pre-eminent performing arts group, reported a sizable decline in donations.
But so far, the ballet is the economy's biggest local arts-related casualty.
The company had been part of the Rose for the past decade. Shortly after an earlier troupe, Ballet Omaha, folded in the mid-1990s, dancer Robin Welch founded a school at the Rose.
In 1999, she launched Omaha Theater Ballet there, and she's been its artistic director and chief choreographer since.
“I hate to see our dancers lose their careers here,” said Welch. “But it's even worse to think of what the community is losing.”
Renee Reiff, whose daughter, Emily, 15, is in the ballet's pre-professional program, said the company's loss would hamper the region's dance education.
“The professional dancers were mentors to our kids,” she said.
Schropp said he would like to continue producing an annual “Nutcracker.” This year's show will proceed as scheduled, but he said it was too early to comment on productions past the current season.
Welch said she has no plans to start another company. However, she said that she will open another school when she finishes at the Rose in 2010.
She said she plans to locate the new school at 84th and F Streets.“That location is going to be better for us, since our students are mostly from west Omaha,” she said.
A new school will be welcome news to parents and students, but it still leaves Rachel Vickrey, the company's prima ballerina, and other dancers without full-time jobs.
“I'm crushed,” she said. “Ballet isn't a job for us. It's our life.”
Contact the writer:
444-1076, john.pitcher@owh.com
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