When Musically Human Theatre founder David Norwood signed an $800-a-year lease on Highland Park's Karger Recreation Center late last year, it seemed like an ideal match. Norwood was looking to relocate his New York-based theater company. Highland Park had a long-empty theater at the city-owned center on Green Bay Road.

But there won't be any musicals in the Karger Center anytime soon. Yesterday afternoon, Norwood issued a statement saying the theater company had closed just months after coming to town and without producing a single show.

Norwood's troubles began well before then. In mid-October, the entire cast of Musically Human's first show—Stephen Sondheim's “Passion”—walked out, posting a collective statement on Facebook that detailed complaints from unsafe work conditions to missing contracts and pay. The Karger Center had no working sinks, no seats for theater patrons and no electrical system compatible with putting on a musical. Norwood was facing eviction from the building for letting the insurance expire.

Moreover, Norwood's official proposal to lease the Karger Center—made last year to Highland Park's Cultural Arts Commission—was largely fiction: The document, obtained by Crain's, incorrectly claimed Musically Human was a nonprofit organization. It lists board members who never worked with Norwood and press clippings announcing New York shows that never opened. And while Norwood is the sole full-time employee of Musically Human, the proposal says the theater had a three-person staff and includes a budget of $110,012 for “personnel” and $27,700 for “general and artistic administration.”

Norwood's description of Musically Human as a nonprofit is untrue, says Highland Park Cultural Arts Commissioner James Lynch. “I cut him the check to pay for the not-for-profit application out of my own pocket,” says Lynch, who was listed as a board member on Musically Human's website and on Norwood's proposal to rent the Karger Center. “David never mailed in the application. I told him Monday (Oct. 31) I couldn't be associated with him or his theater anymore. He was putting my reputation at risk.” Norwood had no comment on the group's nonprofit status.

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Why didn't Highland Park—a community renowned for its support of the arts, home of the Ravinia Festival and the birthplace of Steppenwolf Theatre—more thoroughly vet Norwood, who seems to have taken a page out of “The Music Man”? A few phone calls would have exposed the fake board members. A few more would have revealed that canceled shows and unhappy artists were a recurring theme with the theater company.

Norwood initially submitted his credentials in a proposal to Highland Park's Cultural Arts Commission, a volunteer group dedicated to creating and maintaining a vibrant arts community in the North Shore suburb, and announced in August that the company was moving here.

Lynch is the sole member of the commission who formally interviewed Norwood. The commission's three-person interviewing team at the time also included Rudy Espiritu, assistant city manager, and staff liaison Lee Smith, neither of whom still work for Highland Park.

“David flew out here and took the city by storm,” says Lynch. “He talked to a lot of people; he seemed to have everything in place.” Lynch, who had a long, distinguished career as an actor and a director in Chicago and New York before becoming an executive coach, agreed to be on Musically Human's board. He was the only real board member among those Norwood listed on the proposal to rent the Karger Center. “Could we have done some more checking? Yes,” Lynch says.

According to his LinkedIn page and his biography on Musically Human's website, Norwood, 28, grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, attended Point Park University in Pittsburgh, studied at the Ailey School and the Joffrey Ballet School, and has danced with a pre-professional arm of the Martha Graham School in New York. “The commission didn't do anything like background checks, and they weren't expected to,” says Ghida Neukirch, city manager. “We knew Musically Human was a new theater, and we knew that any new theater brings risks with it. But that's what this space is ideal for—a theater which is still getting established.”

AN IMPRESSIVE PROPOSAL

On the surface, the proposal was impressive. Norwood pitched a three-show season that would star top-tier Equity actors in the shows “Cabaret,” “Sweeney Todd” and the Midwest premiere of “The Bridges of Madison County.” He said he'd create an arts academy for local youth. He listed revenue projections that included $122,400 in ticket sales, $29,550 from foundations, $14,500 from a gala, $5,000 in “government” support and $7,500 in “summer intensive tuition.” He included articles from BroadwayWorld.com touting Musically Human's 2015 productions of “Spring Awakening” and “Passing Strange.” (Neither was ever produced.)

In addition to Lynch, Norwood's proposal listed board members Carlos Armesto, producing director of New York's Theatre C; Scott Miller, artistic director of St. Louis' New Line Theatre; and Carl Sylvestre, a New York-based consultant who helps theaters with fundraising and management. Reached in late October, Sylvestre, Miller and Armesto all say they haven't spoken with Norwood in years. None of them ever served on the board of Musically Human, although Miller lent his name in a nonfiduciary advisory capacity for a brief time several years ago.

When the interviewing committee recommended that Highland Park's City Council lease the Karger Center to Norwood, Michael Halberstam, founder of Writers Theatre in Glencoe, figured prominently. “There is the risk that Musically Human Theatre company could fold,” the recommendation read. “However, Norwood is being mentored by Michael Halberstam, who has joined their board." Halberstam says he was never Norwood's mentor and was never formally attached to the theater. He demanded that his name be removed from all Musically Human materials.

Highwood's Performer's School was also briefly interested in the space but dropped out because the work needed to make the Karger Center viable for classes and performing was prohibitively expensive, the city manager said. Norwood didn't see a problem. Musically Human would have no difficulty paying for the lights and other upgrades to make it into a proper theater, he said. Plus, he said he had a theater he declined to name lined up to donate seats. “All I have to do is get the truck to pick them up,” he said last week.

'EVERYONE HAD WALKED OUT'

In an interview, Norwood says he had no idea there was a problem until the cast left en masse. “It was like when you're walking down the street in winter and all of a sudden the windchill really hits you,” he says. “I thought everything was fine. Nobody had voiced any complaints. I knew we were behind schedule, so I asked the cast about moving the show back two weeks. They all said no. Wouldn't even talk to me about why. The next thing I knew, everyone had walked out.”

None of the actors responded to requests for comment. But a New York actor, Aaron Ramey, says of Norwood, “I don't think there's malice involved. I think what happens is that David just doesn't have the skills to be an effective director or producer. He keeps biting off more than he can chew and then blaming everyone but himself when it doesn't work out.”

Norwood blames most of Musically Human's demise on a “managing director who didn't do their job and doesn't work here anymore.” That person, whom he declines to name, failed to pay both the $2,000 insurance premium and the roughly $1,500 Equity bond, which was required to provide a contract for the sole Equity actor hired for “Passion,” Norwood said.

“I didn't find out about any of this until I found this big pile of unopened mail,” he says. “I was like, 'Oh my God, what is all this? Why haven't these been paid?' This managing director had health issues, I get that. But still . . . you need to be able to do your job. I let them go. Actually, it was a mutual parting of the ways.”

As for the board members who were no such thing, “that was an oversight,” Norwood says. “I had a really fast turnaround on that proposal. I remember reading it after I submitted and thinking 'Wait—was that guy on our advisory board or the regular board? Did I make a mistake there?' In retrospect, I should have taken more time with it.”

Norwood confirms that no one who worked on “Passion” got a dime. The sole Equity actor will be paid for his time “as soon as I get his contract from Equity,” Norwood says. The other artists signed an agreement to be paid a stipend, but when they walked out, they forfeited any pay, he says. “They all broke their agreement when they walked out, so I don't owe them anything.”

In an email Norwood sent to the media after “Passion” was canceled, he explained that there would be no ticket refunds. That statement, he now says, was “a typo. I'm going to give refunds. All people have to do is call.” He would not say how many tickets, which were $38 to $48 apiece, had been sold.

CANCELLED PRODUCTIONS IN NEW YORK

Where the money to pay those refunds will come from is fuzzy.

Musically Human's troubles are no surprise to those who worked with Norwood in New York. His 2015 season of “Passing Strange” and “Spring Awakening” was canceled with no explanation, as was 2012's “Time Between Us.”