SAN DIEGO ARTS WATCH : SNEAK PREVIEW OF ‘BEACH BOYS’

“The Beach Boys: An American Band” sneaks into town today for an 11 a.m. special screening at Del Mar’s Flower Hill Cinema. It opens Friday at the UA Glasshouse Square and Chula Vista theaters. Directed by Malcolm Leo (“This Is Elvis,” “It Came from Hollywood”), this is a feature-length montage of footage from the Beach Boys’ private archives and newly filmed material that attempts to illumine pop stardom.

It almost goes without saying that a screen exploration of The Beach Boys is bound to be more interesting than another Beach Boys concert. The Boys are a pop institution grown so opaque with time and changes that anything Leo can show us about what they’ve gone through and go through among themselves will be worth a few dollars.

As it happens, today’s Flower Hill Cinema screening is only the latest in a string of local premieres at the theater--many of them (though not this one) presented by the Cinema Society of San Diego, a fledgling group headed by La Jolla publicist Andrew Friedenberg. In the last year, the society has premiered about half a dozen films at Flower Hill--among them “All of Me,” “Garbo Talks,” two examples of the Sam Shepard vogue (“Country” and “Paris, Texas”) and Jim Jarmusch’s poem of punk disaffection, “Stranger Than Paradise.”

Friedenberg reports that the society is “about 90% sold out, going great and ready for next season.” On Tuesday, the society will hold the San Diego premiere of the Jack Lemmon (and Joan Kroc-financed) film “Mass Appeal.”

Friedenberg says he is hoping to land “Mask,” the upcoming Peter Bogdonovich film starring Cher, and arrange a special screening of “Kronus,” the ambitious film-in-progress utilizing the Reuben H. Fleet Space Theater’s Omnifax format. Next season, Friedenberg hopes to offer the film versions of stage smashes “Agnes of God” and “A Chorus Line.”

BACK FOR GOOD: Jazz disc jockey Art Good has returned to the air perch that made him a local favorite, KIFM (98)--though not quite with star billing. Good had pioneered KIFM’s popular jazz program, “Lites Out San Diego” before splitting early last year to launch a new jazz show in the same time slot on KBZT (K-BEST 95). Good’s KBZT show failed in the ratings battle and was recently dropped. Now Good is doing morning-drive newscasts and “life style features” during Lynda Smith’s KIFM show, “complementing” host Larry Himmel on the nightly “Lites Out” show, and hosting the 1 p.m.-7 p.m. Sunday jazz broadcast. Then again, if Himmel’s nightly “San Diego at Large” TV show catches on and takes Himmel away from Lites Out, it’s a safe bet that Good would take over.

GLOBE GLAM: Lily Tomlin and Christopher Reeve will lend their star profiles to the Old Globe Theatre’s current Year of Jubilee as “co-chairpersons” for activities celebrating the Globe’s 50th anniversary. Tomlin is headed for Broadway with a one-woman show she broke in last year at the Globe, while Reeve began his professional career at the Globe’s 1972 Shakespeare Festival. Globe artistic director Jack O’Brien says that both “hope to attend our May 29 birthday celebration, the Sept. 14 Jubilee Gala, and any other event that coincides with their availability.”

ARTBEATS: Yu-mei Wei, a 10th-grade student at Coronado High School, won first place in the fourth annual San Diego Symphony Orchestra’s Young Artist Concerto Competition. Wei played Chopin’s Concerto No. 1 in E-minor, Op.11, first movement, and his Polonaise, Op. 22. She’ll perform with the orchestra at the Young People’s Concerts, May 31 and June 7 . . . On Friday, by the way, the symphony will be moving from its Balboa Park offices into new, larger digs adjacent to downtown’s Fox Theatre, soon to be the Orchestra’s Symphony Hall. The symphony association has been a Balboa Park resident for nearly 30 years. . . .

The Wells Fargo Foundation has awarded $75,000 to the San Diego Historical Society for a Frontier Gallery to showcase local history since 1850, in the Museum of San Diego History, a 20,000-square-foot exhibit space under construction in Balboa Park. . . .

Tuesday’s review of the Old Globe’s production of “Stage Struck” incorrectly listed some curtain times. Saturday and Sunday matinees are at 2 p.m.; Sunday evening’s performance is at 7 o’clock. . . .

Applications for National Endowment for the Arts visual artists fellowships for 1985-86 are coming due. Painting applications are due Friday; those for printmaking, drawing and artists’ books are due March 25. Application forms can still be picked up at Installation Gallery, 447 5th Ave., Wednesday through Saturday from noon to 5 p.m.