Canadian Dance Company Close to Closing

Vancouver's Ballet BC dance company was pushed closer to the brink last week when Scotiabank froze almost $17,000 of the company's money, The Globe and Mail reported. Ballet BC board chairman Graeme Barrit said the money represents around 20 per cent of Ballet BC's available cash.

“Although $17,000 doesn't sound like an awful lot of money," Barrit said, "when you are as close to the edge of the abyss as we are right now, it really is a very dramatic hit to our ability to function between now and the new year, and really does put the project in great jeopardy."

Ballet BC already laid off 38 employees in November, including its dancers and creative director. Its current production of The Nutcracker was only able to run after the company received a grant from the Vancouver City Council and an anonymous donor bought 1,000 tickets; ticket sales are still short of their goal.

Aside from understanding that this could be a fatal blow to the dance company, we at Blog Stage are not as numbers-savvy as the employees of Scotiabank, so we'll let you read the full story, "Ballet BC dealt another blow," for more info.

-- Daniel Lehman