ARTS
Museums
The trials of Count Schouvaloff
Nicky Bird
Alexander Schouvaloff was, until last week, the patrician and distinguished Curator of the Theatre Museum in Covent Garden, a post he had held since 1974. The Museum is run, badly and reluctantly, by the V&A. In a collector's euphemism the V&A's Director, Mrs Esteve-Coll, recent- ly described how inconvenient curators would be 'otherwise accommodated' which, translated from the Civil Servese, means the boot, the elbow, the early bath. Count Schouvaloff has been 'otherwise accommodated', or 'asked to take early retirement', as the press release has it.
What has he done wrong? Apparently nothing. The press release maintains that `his competence and efficiency as curator are not an issue' (odd this, as Mrs Esteve Coll was quoted in the Sunday Times as saying the exact opposite). It goes on to praise his `great dedication', his 'vision and skill', his 'perseverance' without which the Museum would 'never have seen the light of day'. A bit rum, you might think, losing a paragon who embodies the finer qualities of Lord Reith and St Thomas Aquinas.
Why has he gone then? 'As a result', says the same press release, 'of differing plans for the future development of the Museum', This is nonsense. There are no plans and thus Schouvaloff could hardly have differed from them. In so far as the V&A has a policy it is to sink it, as one trustee indicated privately a fortnight ago. Esteve-Coll tried to reassure anxious staff last week that the Theatre Museum would survive 'as long as there is money to fund it'. But the same day the Assistant Director (Collections) revealed that the V&A would be 'bankrupt by November'.
The V&A's Director has conceded pri- vately that the Schouvaloff affair is a `mess'. It is worse. It is the culmination of a long campaign to oust him that began when he fell foul of the previous Director, Sir Roy Strong. His crime, quite simply, was to save the Theatre Museum. The Rayner Report, a 'scrutiny' of the national museums, had recommended in 1982 that the Theatre Museum be strangled at birth, to save money. The V&A's management spluttered outrage but instructed Schouva- loff to do nothing. He refused. After a brilliant and public battle he won. The Theatre Museum was safe, even surviving a further attempt to kill it the very next year.
Schouvaloff's success and insubordina- tion were an affront. Strong wouldn't talk to him or meet him. At one stage Schouva- loff attempted a reconciliation. 'I will meet you on the steps outside the V&A on Monday at noon. You will recognise me by the white carnation in my buttonhole.' Strong did not show. The bile affected the civil servants, who remained after Strong left. They admire subservience, a quality Schouvaloff sadly lacks. A scapegoat was needed for the failure of the Theatre Museum to attact its target of 220,000 visitors a year, a ludicrous figure dreamt up by a consultant. No one except Schouvaloff saw it as absurd, given the compulsory admission charge (£2.25), the cut-price installation, the tiny adyertis- ing budget and the competing attractions of Covent Garden. Last year the attend- ance was 65,000. Schouvaloff was blamed. Schouvaloff must go.
On 17 May this year he was told he would face a review board that would examine his competence, and that he might be dismissed without compensation. Jim Close, the Assistant Director (Administra- tion) would be on the board, a man who once said that `Schouvaloff gets right up my nose.' All was smug satisfaction in the corridors of power at the V&A.
Enter the portly and impressive figure of Lord Goodman, Schouvaloff's lawyer. Goodman threatened an injunction to re- move Close from the tribunal, and stated that Esteve-Coll's remarks to the Sunday Times were prejudicial and actionable, and would lead at the very least to a certain victory on appeal. The V&A took fright and approached the Schouvaloff camp. `We're not going to win this one', conceded the Director's assistant. Would they negotiate?
The deal is an expensive one. As a V&A mole confirms, it involves compensation for Mrs Esteve-Coll's damaging public carping plus payment by the V&A of Goodman's fees. The damages are dis- guised in an ex gratia payment that is taxable, so the cost of paying an agreed net sum to Schouvaloff for the insult is a third greater than if the damages had been admitted (they are tax-free). The accom- panying statement is nothing less than a humiliating, and hypocritical, retraction.
An unedifying vendetta: the result, as one of Shouvaloff's advisers observed, of `unmotivated malice'. Three years ago Schouvaloff suffered a serious heart attack, in part brought on by the strain of endless squabbles and his campaigns to save his Museum. Even while he was convalescing, the V&A's management continued to send him letters nitpickingly critical of his every past action. The same unsentimental atti- tude was evident when Schouvaloff, having been informed verbally of his possible appearance. before a star chamber, heard nothing more — despite entreaties — for five weeks. And then he was told of a date for a tribunal that had secretly been cancelled. Such insensitivity could have been terminal.
And what of the Theatre Museum, that Marie Celeste as Mrs Esteve-Coll called it in a phrase that demolished morale and was followed by the immediate loss of £30,000 of promised sponsorship? Tactless or not, the description has proved prophe- tic. The Marie Celeste was crewless. By September, five senior staff among a small complement at the Theatre Museum will have left.. There are no plans to replace them. The implications are transparent and are particularly worrying for benefactors. Already one major bequest has been lost. The V&A is broke. It cannot afford to run the Theatre Museum. But it does not admit it publicly. Instead the Director and her civil servants dither. Two sponsorship proposals engendered by Schouvaloff for a total of nearly £5 million have been jeopar- dised because of frustration at the V&A's indecision. No museum can afford to lose such funds, let alone one entrusted with a national archive and as emaciated as the Theatre Museum. It is a unique collection, reflecting Britain's incomparable theatrical tradition. It must be saved. Again.
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