I'm the Artistic Director for a youth theatre.  Because we're just one year old and don't have enough resources, students pay to be in our productions.  Students are able to sign up for only one semester so I had no idea how many students would be in our spring musical. I couldn't pick a show without knowing the general cast size I would have so students had to sign up before we picked the show.  I've spent between 80 and 100 hours looking at musicals online and watching clips on youtube.  The deadline for registration was December 1 so I would have a month to finalize which show we'd do and plan for auditions in early January.  Our current student roster is 10 girls and 2 boys.  The show I chose for us to do is a new show of MTI that showcases a lot of girls and for a lot of other reasons, I think it'll be a good choice.

So here's my problem: we had our board meeting yesterday and I presented the show option and my board (3 other parents) didn't like my choice.  One member was really pushing for well known shows like "Fiddler", "Oklahoma", etc.  I'm more into doing more modern pop-rock musicals.  The other 2 said they would trust my judgment since I've been looking for months and haven't found another show that works with our numbers.  But we're at an impasse because they didn't approve my choice so we couldn't approve the budget or staff needs. 

At this point I'm not sure how to proceed.  Auditions are less than a month away and I have been looking for a musical since April so I know what's out there.  I'm really insulted that they hired me to choose the season and now are basically saying they know better than me although they haven't looked.  And I'd like to enjoy my Christmas without having to work on finding another show so I don't want to start all over.

Has anyone dealt with a conflict between the AD and the board?  Does the board have to unanimously approve the season? 

As Gaafa said, it really depends on the rules of you theater. In my theatre the board votes on the season as a whole and it must be approved by the majority. It's rare that these types of decisions would require a unanimous vote.

 

As to the comment about "can't expect volunteers to do what they say", this can be taken in two ways.

 

If you speak about "volunteers" as a whole, then this statement is, unfortunately, quite accurate. Your exact case is a perfect example that I have run across a couple times. The group will agree to do a show that would be great for school groups and everyone says we will go out an solicit these groups, but in the end it never happens.

 

On the other hand if you are talking about a single volunteer agreeing to do something, then in my opinion they should be expected to follow through. I know in reality this often happens, but I will never defend someone for not doing something that they agreed to do.