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Edward Einhorn's disruption letter

Judge Lewis Kaplan, in his decision in EINHORN VS. MERGATROYD PRODUCTIONS accurately described this letter as "a long-ish e-mail, a rather petulant e-mail, the plain object of which was to threaten to disrupt the opening unless he got his money."

From: Utc61@aol.com
Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 12:09:42 EDT

I have held back from speaking more fully on the subject of what happened with Jonathan and Nancy, but as Jonathan has informed I will not be paid for my work, I feel it behooves me to inform you of the situiation.

Yestedrday, Jonathan and Nancy expressed that they did not like the set. In discussing it, I made a reluctant compromise to cut the scrim and projections, but keep the rest. We also had disgreements on matters of cotumes and such, and throughout I have been dealing, in private, with these demands, and trying to accomodate each one of them. Apparently, while I was gone, they decided that was not sufficient, and Jonathan smashed the table and kicked down the grass.

I was very upset when I heard that, and honestly, did consider quitting, because I was originally under the impression he had also destroyed the chairs (he had originally asked that they be removed, as well), and therefore much of the show would have to be reblocked. However, when I found out that the chairs weren't destroyed, I called Jonathan, with the intention of contuiung.

He immediately fired me, saying :Under the circumstances, it would be better that you don't continue with this project."

As you all know, I have worked on this project nonstop for two months, giving 16 hour days, foregoing seeing my mother in the hospital over the last few days so I can get the project done. I have both done my directing work and helped in areas that usually are unrelated, such as producing. Even today I got an phone call from the Caledonian Club that they were going to try to get people to come to this show.

As you know, I have done the full work of a director, minus the one day I was not invited to come to the theater. BAsed on that, Jonathan proposes holding back my salary of $1000. I find this outrageous.

In his defense, Jonathan points out that I did not end up signing the original contract. We had a dispute over minore elements in it, and as we got swept into the process of rehearsal, I let that dispute fall by the wayside. But the major terms of it are clear and undeniable and supported by a number of emails.

I am sorry to involve you. I have tried to stay positive, because I feel you all do good work, and you deserve to perform the play you have been rehearsing. However, this behavior is unconcionable, in my opinion, and personally, I would advise you to demand your salaries immediately.

Edward Einhorn

Comments

  1. Einhorn claimed Jonathan said he would not pay him, but in fact, he said he wasn't obliged to pay Einhorn because Einhorn didn't sign a contract. But Jonathan offered, both verbally and by email to pay Einhorn, and in fact planned to offer him $500 had Einhorn deigned to negotiate. But Einhorn wanted $1000 (at first, he later demanded $2000, and then $150,000 for every performance of TAM LIN in 2004 and 2005) but Kaplan only granted him $800. So Einhorn literally made a federal case over a difference of $300.
  2. Einhorn made a big deal about the TAM LIN project impacting his schedule and seeing his mother in the hospital, but in fact the TAM LIN rehearsal schedule was organized around Einhorn's own schedule, and we never expected him, nor did we ask him, to forgo seeing his mother. In fact, Mergatroyd Productions attempted to send flowers to Einhorn's mother in the hospital but she was not allowed to receive any because she was in intensive care.
  3. Einhorn claimed to work on the project 16 hours a day. However, Mergatroyd Productions certainly never asked him to, and we did not see any evidence of all the work he claimed to do, when he wasn't at rehearsals (which were certainly not 16 hours a day.) Einhorn added busywork for himself which Mergatroyd Productions did not ask of him, and so Mergatroyd Productions cannot be held responsible. Einhorn did things like research medieval Scotland, even after I told him that historical accuracy was not desired. And part of his research, he admitted, was watching Mel Gibson's "Braveheart."
  4. Einhorn makes it sound as though we asked him to make changes to the set on a whim. But in fact, his use of a scrim turned out to be a bad idea, when the black lights he wanted to use in the same scenes as the scrim lit up the scrim and made it opaque when it was supposed to be translucent. Einhorn conducted an expensive and time-consuming theatre tech experiment and it failed. We felt that we had to dismiss Einhorn in order to save the show.
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