BROADWAY Financial problems force setback in 'Gem's' performance schedule

The goal is to begin preview performances Nov. 16, one performer said.
NEW YORK (AP) -- Performances have been canceled through Nov. 14 for "Gem of the Ocean," August Wilson's new play, as its producers continued to scramble for the nearly $1 million needed to open the show on Broadway.
Tickets are still on sale for all performances beginning Nov. 16, five days after "Gem" originally was to have opened at the Walter Kerr Theater, Michael Hartman, a production spokesman, said this week.
A new performance schedule as well as a new opening date will be announced shortly, Hartman said.
The money, half of the show's reported $2 million production costs, is being sought by Jujamcyn Theatres and the Araca Group, the new producing team for "Gem." They joined the project after the show lost a major investor, just as the production was finishing a tryout engagement in Boston.
"We're working diligently to find replacement funds to make up the shortfall," Michael Rego, one of the principals in the Araca Group, said. "We are cautiously optimistic."
Available date
Rego said the goal is to begin preview performances Nov. 16 and open sometime after that.
The producers may have a difficult time finding an available date. November is a particularly busy month on and off-Broadway with most of the desirable opening nights before Thanksgiving taken by such high-profile plays as Michael Frayn's "Democracy," Woody Allen's "A Second Hand Memory," Sam Shepard's "The God of Hell" and one-person shows starring Whoopi Goldberg and Dame Edna.
"Gem of the Ocean," set in 1904 Pittsburgh, opens Wilson's ambitious 10-play cycle depicting the black experience in America in the 20th century, one play for each decade. Although it begins the saga, "Gem" was the ninth play in the cycle to be written, following such well-received efforts as "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom," "Fences" and "Jitney."
The story focuses on an ancient spiritual healer named Aunt Ester, played by Phylicia Rashad, and her dealings with a young man (John Earl Jelks) in need of redemption.