Playhouse Merced, recovering from public split, has new board, performance planned
More than four months after its board of directors split in two, Playhouse Merced is back and trying to get its house in order.
The nonprofit community theater — which produces live shows and offers youth arts education programs — has a new board, is cleaning up its finances and, finally, has new productions planned.
At its Jan. 14 meeting on Zoom, board members discussed their plans to get Playhouse Merced back on track.
Sam Yniguez, Debbie Bier, Brooke Gutierrez and Stacie Guzman have assumed the positions of president, vice president, treasurer and secretary, respectively.
According to Yniguez, the former board members were removed per the organization’s bylaws, which state that unexcused absences from three consecutive meetings result in automatic removal from the board.
The transition has not been entirely smooth: The new board members say they’ve been locked out of important accounts including Quickbooks, where financial records were kept, the Playhouse Merced website and its Instagram account.
Why did the Playhouse Merced Board split?
The breakdown of Playhouse Merced’s leadership came during a public meeting in which both sides claimed the other was not legitimate. The meeting ended with the Merced Police Department advising participants to disperse.
The split led to canceled shows and employee resignations.
“Things were such a mess,” Yniguez said about the process of recovering access and attempting to account for past spending. The board worked with outside specialists in human resources, payroll services and bookkeeping to straighten things out.
Gutierrez said she knew experts and consultants “in the nonprofit world” through her work on other boards.
Getting nonprofit’s finances in order
At its Jan. 14 board meeting, Gutierrez shared that the “accountant has been working so hard since late September or October to help us get our finances all in our new … system. She’s had to reconcile for the past two years and she is now complete.”
“This is directly from our bookkeeper,” said Gutierrez, reading aloud from the narrative summary provided by the accountant. “‘Financial situation is improving as the board has established effective oversight of expenditures. This is evidenced by notable reduction in unnecessary monthly transactions lacking supporting documentation.’”
The report also stated that current expenses exceed income, largely due to the cost of the cleanup work.
According to Gutierrez, the playhouse has about $25,000 in savings and an additional $116,000 that is earmarked for scholarships.
The cost to produce a show varies substantially, but can easily run between $15,000 and $23,000. That includes the cost of performance rights, paying the conservatory director, assistant director, musical director and choreographer, as well as set design and other direct costs.
“I love hearing that there are no irregularities,” Yniguez said of the financial accounting.
Merced theater fans express support
Over a dozen people — including parents of conservatory students, former employees of the playhouse and longtime Merced theater aficionados — attended the meeting on Zoom. They expressed support for the new board members and thanked them for their work to improve transparency.
“A lot of us on the board are working in public agencies ... that’s what we’re trained to do,” Gutierrez said.
The board will continue to adhere to California’s open-meeting laws, including announcing meetings in advance and allowing the public to join, it said.
An interim executive director
At the meeting, the board also approved a resolution to affirm the hiring of RC Essig as interim executive director.
Essig has been involved with Playhouse Merced for more than a decade and also owns The Partisan and The 17th Street Pub on Main Street.
Essig said he would have accepted the job only on an interim basis. “I think that that position needs to go out to the public. And so part of my … responsibility is to get everything back in place, make sense of stuff and then be part of the hiring process for whoever’s (going to) step in next.”
He emphasized the need for an executive director and explained that the board acting as staff had caused confusion in the past. Essig was also the executive director of Playhouse Merced in 2019.
He is working with the community to prepare a full spring and summer program for 2026. He said he has a long list of people to speak with but, “I’m starting with the community, and that’s … my goal. Start with the community, the … actors, the directors, the musicians, the … artists, the people that go to the shows.”
Cancelled show is back on
One of the first orders of business is to reschedule the performance of “Oliver! Jr.” that was planned for last fall. “Oliver! Jr.” is a conservatory show and actors from the children’s conservatory program were cast in the fall of 2025.
In addition to serving as board treasurer, Gutierrez is a parent to children in the conservatory program.
“My children will (need to relearn their lines),” she said, but “they would not need to re-memorize the songs because they are still singing these in the shower.”
Performance dates have not been announced, but Playhouse Merced will hold its season preview in late April 2026.
