Emmy Awards consider new downtown LA theater home

Thursday December 19, 2002

By LYNN ELBER
AP Television Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) Following the Academy Awards' lead in moving to a custom-built theater, Emmy organizers are seeking a new home for their ceremony in a planned downtown development.

The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' board of directors approved a letter of intent for a 15-year lease on a proposed theater in what would be called the LA Live complex, an entertainment, hotel and retail center.

``The chance to take a bigger-than-life awards show and match it with a state-of-the-art theater is the kind of stuff Hollywood dreams are made of,'' academy Chairman Bryce Zabel said Wednesday.

The board agreed Dec. 12 to sign a letter of intent with the business group AEG, which in May 2000 proposed a 43-acre, $1 billion development across from the Staples Center owned and operated by AEG.

AEG, a developer and sports and theater operator, is a wholly owned subsidiary of billionaire Philip Anschutz's Anschutz Corp.

The Emmy Awards would be the anchor tenant for a 200,000-square-foot theater designed to seat between 6,000 to 7,000 people. The awards' current home, the Shrine Auditorium south of downtown, seats about 6,000.

Other major awards ceremonies would be precluded from using the new theater, with the possible exception of the Latin Grammys, the academy said.

It's expected the theater, if built, wouldn't be ready before 2006, Zabel said, adding the lease cost would be equivalent to what the academy is paying now.

The Shrine agreement runs through next year, the awards' 55th, and the academy would expect to keep the show there until the new theater was ready, he said. Zabel praised the facility but said the academy couldn't pass up the chance for a custom-made awards home.

The academy deal with AEG is contingent on construction of a hotel adjacent to the theater that could accommodate the Governors Ball that follows the Emmys, Zabel said.

The city's financial participation in the hotel is critical to its construction and to the entire project, AEG spokesman Michael Roth said Wednesday. Parking lots currently cover much of the land intended for development.

``The city of Los Angeles has approved the zoning and other important elements to develop the site, including the hotel,'' Roth said, but city funding is still under discussion.

A major hotel would help increase business at the nearby Los Angeles Convention Center, Roth said. There are 900 nearby hotel rooms, compared with 10,000 hotel rooms within walking distance of San Francisco's convention center, he said.

``It's an important investment the city needs to make not only for the moving-forward financial success of the Los Angeles Convention Center but the continued revitalization of downtown Los Angeles,'' he said.

The issue is expected to be resolved sometime next year, he said.

City Councilwoman Jan Perry, who represents the area, said the council is working on the issue ``very aggressively'' because of the project's importance to downtown.

City support could be derived from sources related to the project itself, such as parking revenue or new tax revenue, Perry said, and wouldn't be diverted from other city needs.

In March, the Oscars moved to the Kodak Theatre in a newly developed retail-hotel complex in Hollywood. AEG operates but doesn't own the Kodak.

Retail stores in the high-profile complex have struggled, in part because of a slump in international tourism and the struggling economy, but Roth said he didn't see a parallel with the proposed downtown complex.

``They're in two different regions of the city, built for different purposes,'' he said, adding that Kodak theater bookings have been satisfactory.

Zabel said he was confident a new downtown theater would be a boon for the Emmys regardless of the center's retail performance.

The academy has been newly assertive under Zabel. In November, it boosted its revenue after striking an eight-year, $52 million deal with ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC to rotate the Emmy broadcast. HBO had helped serve as a bargaining chip by putting a five-year, $50 million offer for exclusive rights on the table.

(Copyright 2002 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)