Kennedy Center’s Leader Focuses on a Grand Vision and Small Details

When Michael M. Kaiser was executive director of the Royal Opera House, in London, he paced so much during performances

that the artists and crew members nicknamed a portion of backstage “Kaiserstrasse,” meaning “Kaiser Street” in German.

When Thomas E. Wheeler learned that detail about Mr. Kaiser, he says he knew he had found the right match for the next president of Washington’s John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

“Here’s a guy who cares about the details,” says Mr. Wheeler, a longtime Kennedy Center board member who co-chaired the search committee. “That’s a mark of a great leader, that he is down there physically, worrying about the smallest thing.”

Since arriving at the center in 2001, Mr. Kaiser, 51, still does his share of walking at the giant arts complex. But with six theaters, Mr. Kaiser sometimes relies on the television monitors in his office to stay connected to the performances and rehearsals.

Soon he will have even more room to roam. The Kennedy Center is in the planning stages of a construction project to build an expansive plaza that will improve pedestrian access from downtown. The federal government has agreed to provide up to $400-million for the project.

Mr. Kaiser decided the center needed more than a new plaza, however. He wanted to build more office and rehearsal space, as well as a museum for the performing arts, so he started a $250-million campaign to raise money from private sources. So far, the campaign has attracted about $150-million.

The Catherine B. Reynolds Foundation, in McLean, Va., has given $100-million for an education center, which will house the performing-arts museum.

Mr. Kaiser says he relishes the opportunity to raise money. “I love fund raising,”he says. “Ilove discerning what it is that the donor gets from making a gift and how to make it as enticing as possible for a donor to give to you.”

Cutting Costs

Mr. Kaiser also likes to savemoney: He has slashed $6-million from the Kennedy Center’s budget since he arrived, mainly by reducing travel expenses, avoiding office redecorating, and getting rid of other spending he considered unnecessary. Good work on stage builds morale, he says, “not getting a piece of cantaloupe at a staff meeting.”

He also generates good will among the 1,200 staff members by greeting many people by name as he walks around the building, and he stays in close touch with the center’s backstage crew and visiting performers by often sitting in on performance rehearsals. (At a previous job at the Kansas City Ballet he even took ballet classes so that he could better understand what dancers go through.)

“He talks to people of all levels. He’s not up there sitting behind a desk,” says Claudette Donlon, who oversees the center’s construction projects, among other duties, and has worked with Mr. Kaiser at two other organizations. “He recognizes what those people contribute to the success of the institution.”

While Mr. Kaiser has chalked up fund-raising success and trimmed expenses, the center has been criticized by the Government Accountability Office for several cost overruns in renovating the Opera House, Concert Hall, and public spaces. The report also questioned why the center had not installed sprinklers in its large central halls. Mr. Kaiser defended the construction schedule and the sprinkler decision during a Capitol Hill hearing in April. Several of the projects criticized began in 1995, six years before he arrived, and he had no say in determining their initial budgets.

Mr. Kaiser, who built his reputation by shoring up fiscally troubled arts groups, wears multiple hats at the center. Not only is he responsible for an annual budget of $145-million, but he also has final say in what appears on stage.

Since taking the reins, Mr. Kaiser has announced one blockbuster program after another, including annual performances by the Kirov Ballet and the Kirov Opera, of St. Petersburg, Russia, and the Royal Shakespeare Company, of London, and a visit by the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra. He works closely with Leonard Slatkin, the music director of the National Symphony Orchestra, which has its home at the center, and also helps dozens of other aspiring and working arts administrators through two arts-management programs he started.

The creative and managerial sides of his job connect, he says, because programming great art leads to larger audiences and more donations.

For example, shortly after he arrived at the center, Mr. Kaiser announced plans to produce six plays by Stephen Sondheim in repertory starring a string of acclaimed actors, including Christine Baranski and Brian Stokes Mitchell. A New York couple who had never given the center a penny wrote a check for $100,000 because the program excited them, he says. The couple knew about the Sondheim shows because of a full-page advertisement trumpeting the center’s season that appeared in The New York Times. The advertisement, Mr. Kaiser’s idea, also appeared in The Washington Post and has helped increase the center’s visibility and reach, he says.

The Sondheim shows drew rave reviews and audiences from 33 countries into packed houses and signified an artistic revival for the center that observers credit Mr. Kaiser with spearheading.

“He is putting the Kennedy Center on the map as a producing organization again,” says Todd Haimes, artistic director of the Roundabout Theatre Company, in New York. Before Mr. Kaiser arrived, he adds, the center’s reputation was as “a very, very upscale booking house.”

And despite the tough economy since Mr. Kaiser took over, leaders of other arts organizations have noted the Kennedy Center’s ability to push ahead with new projects.

“This has not been a time of great boldness for many organizations,” says Jerry E. Mandel, president of the Orange County Performing Arts Center, in Costa Mesa, Calif. “Michael Kaiser tries things other people would be fearful to try. He’s our most important leader. He’ll make some mistakes, but he’s out there.”

Showcasing first-rate artists and producing international festivals, such as the Festival of China planned for October, costs big money beyond revenue raised through ticket sales.

The center’s development staff, led by Mr. Kaiser, raised $39-million the year he arrived. This year, they are aiming not just for the $52-million the center needs in operating expenses, but also to make headway on the capital campaign.

‘His Life’s Mission’

Mr. Kaiser’s sincerity, not his showmanship, helps secure large gifts, says Marie Mattson, the center’s vice president for development. “It’s not that he jumps around and tears come to his eyes,” she says, when describing how Mr. Kaiser talks to big donors. “But it’s immediately apparent that No. 1, he knows what he’s talking about, and No. 2, this really is his life’s mission.”

Mr. Kaiser says he keeps in mind a menu of projects that need support, and when he talks to donors he tries to determine which project might interest them the most.

Mr. Kaiser’s skill in attracting gifts goes beyond matchmaking, says Alberto Vilar, the technology financier who gave the center $50-million to pay for the Kirov residencies and an arts-management program. Mr. Vilar appreciates Mr. Kaiser’s ability to discuss a range of topics, both artistic and financial.

But what he likes best is that Mr. Kaiser treats him with respect and does not brush off Mr. Vilar’s passion for the arts. “He doesn’t talk up or down to you,” says Mr. Vilar. “Some people might have the view that they know a lot and you are an outside donor. But those big donors have such a love of the art form that they may well know as much as you do.”

While the stock-market drop a few years ago caused Mr. Vilar to put any additional gifts on hold, he is still on schedule with his payments to the center, says Mr. Kaiser.

In addition to Mr. Vilar’s support, Mr. Kaiser attracted the largest gift in the center’s history, the $100-million donation from the Reynolds Foundation. Previously the foundation had contributed $10-million for the center to use over the next decade at Mr. Kaiser’s discretion for programs of superior artistic merit that it otherwise might not be able to afford.

Before her recent Kennedy Center donation, Catherine B. Reynolds made headlines when she sought a measure of control over a donation to a Smithsonian museum. Ms. Reynolds eventually decided to rescind the bulk of the gift. Mr. Kaiser, who says Ms. Reynolds approached him to talk about potential donations after reading about some of his plans in The Washington Post, has managed to steer clear of any tensions with Ms. Reynolds. In fact, the two are so close that she held a surprise party for Mr. Kaiser’s 50th birthday.

In addition to gifts from individuals, Mr. Kaiser is also aided in fund raising by the $17-million the federal government allocated the center this year for maintenance. The government is paying for the plaza construction project because Congress designated the Kennedy Center, which opened in 1971, as a national memorial to the late president.

Staying Put

In return for the effort Mr. Kaiser puts into running the Kennedy Center, he is one of the highest paid charity officials in the United States. He earned a salary of $728,182 in 2003, the most-recent year for which information is publicly available.

James A. Johnson, who was the center’s board chairman when Mr. Kaiser was hired, says he never raised an eyebrow at the sum. “We have set extremely aggressive goals for ourselves to be a premier institution on the global stage, and we should pay what we need to pay in order to get that job done,” he says.

Before he took over the Kennedy Center, Mr. Kaiser had never stayed at a job more than a few years. But he recently agreed to run the center until at least 2011. He says the center’s financial stability and the opportunity to flex his creative muscles appeal to him.

In addition, Washington has been good for his health: Mr. Kaiser has shed 55 pounds since joining the center. He hits the gym most mornings — and he plans to keep burning calories pacing around the center.