FESTIVAL 2 WAITING IN THE WINGS

Robert J. Fitzpatrick is now admittedly “very optimistic.” Having gone from “elation” to “disappointment” to “practically despair” just two months ago, the man who ran the Olympic Arts Festival last summer is in fact feeling so good about the prospects of a second arts festival in Los Angeles that he has already begun speaking of--and earnestly planning for--Festival 2.

In an expansive mood, as he awaits some crucial decisions by Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee officials next Wednesday, he will even refer to a Festival 3, Festival 4 and so on. He envisions these events every other year, beginning in 1987.

By the end of April and into May, Fitzpatrick, chairman of the Mayor’s Blue Ribbon Committee for a Second Festival, is scheduled to be in Paris and London for discussions with “major” (and thus far unnamed) artists and companies about participating in it. That is, if things work out.

The future of such a festival for Los Angeles--and quite possibly the others--could well hinge on what happens next week. Both the LAOOC board of directors and the board of its charitable foundation, the Amateur Athletic Foundation, must decide in meetings at the Century Plaza hotel whether to amend the bylaws of the foundation to permit funding of an arts festival. Then the 17-member foundation board must also vote to commit money. Paul Ziffren, board chairman of the LAOOC and its charitable foundation, says “there’s been discussion” about $2 million. If the support comes through, Fitzpatrick strongly hints he will then formally announce a second festival the very next day.

Both Fitzpatrick and Ziffren walk a political tightrope when asked if they expect Olympic money. They do not want any statements to imply that the board’s decision is a foregone conclusion, although from the outside it appears to be as likely as Mayor Tom Bradley’s landslide reelection was on Tuesday. “Having spent four years in Baltimore’s City Council before I came to Los Angeles, I have learned never to spend my money until the check is passed,” Fitzpatrick said.

“It’s still iffy,” a tight-lipped Ziffren cautioned.

What is not iffy is that the power establishment of this city, beginning with Bradley himself, appears to be solidly behind the concept of a second festival. The mayor has been quietly working behind the scenes, visiting corporate leaders, phoning them, seeking financial backing. And a co-sponsor of the resolution to fund a second festival is none other than Peter Ueberroth, who ran the Olympic Games, and is now one of the five members of the blue-ribbon festival committee.

Despite his disclaimers, Ziffren, when asked what he has been hearing from his board, allowed that “there have been suggestions that since the arts festival was a part of the Olympics, it would be altogether fitting and proper that it should continue to be a part of the Olympics for one more time. Then a decision can be made after that.”

Support also appears to extend to the state attorney general’s office. Los Angeles’ Olympic officials have sought formal permission from the state attorney general’s charitable trust division for a change in the Amateur Athletic Foundation’s bylaws to permit funding a festival. Approval must be given before any votes can occur. And that appears to be moving along without a hitch.

Carole Kornblum, the assistant attorney general in charge of the division, told The Times that there “shouldn’t be any problem.” In fact, she said, if the deputy in her department who is preparing the decision is unable to issue a ruling in time, and “we’re pushing him very hard . . . the fact is we may even be able to give telephone approval to the (LAOOC) attorneys who submitted the request.”

Maureen Kindel, president of the city’s Board of Public Works and a member of the blue-ribbon festival committee as well as the Amateur Athletic Foundation board, noted that because no one had anticipated the huge size of the Olympic surplus, language allowing for contributions to an arts festival was “inadvertently omitted” at the time the foundation was set up. Kindel, who is co-sponsoring the resolution for support along with Ueberroth, said that “so far there doesn’t appear to be any opposition.”

Fitzpatrick estimates that the 1987 festival will cost $8 million. Of that, he says he will need $5 million up front, before ticket and related sales, to produce the kind of “quality” artistic event appropriate to the city. The Olympic Arts Festival cost $10 million--with $5 million underwritten by Times Mirror Co. Robert F. Erburu, president and chief executive of Times Mirror, is also a member of the blue-ribbon festival committee.

A spokesman for Times Mirror said that for 1987, “we are willing to join other corporate sponsors and stand ready to contribute up to $500,000. And we expect that there will be other corporate sponsors.”

Another key building block for 1987 is the $1 million that the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency is considering donating as a kind “challenge grant,” contingent on festival organizers raising the other $4 million from the private sector. Amateur Athletic Foundation money would, of course, accomplish half that goal. With another $500,000, they would be that much closer to goal.

CRA Administrator Ed Helfeld, who offered support for a second festival even before the first festival ended, said he would be prepared to recommend the $1 million grant to his agency’s seven-member board at an appropriate point. He said the money would come from the 1% requirement for art spending of downtown development construction costs. “It’s an incredible opportunity to continue something of such international and local success,” he said, noting that the festival itself would be concentrated downtown. Without Olympic money, he added, the effort would be that much more difficult.

While it isn’t quite dominoes, Fitzpatrick believes that without Olympic and CRA money, a second festival is highly unlikely. “Barring something falling out of the skies--some as-yet unidentified funding source--and given the amount of time and preparation necessary, unless the CRA and Amateur Athletic Foundation grants are approved, I don’t see how we can do another festival. Although conceivably, one of these grants could not take place and someone mysteriously appears with a million dollars. . . .”

“It can’t be a nickel-and-dime operation,” the festival impresario said of the 1987 production. “This is too big a city, too important a city.

“The time is ripe for the United States to have a regular ongoing festival,” he added, undoubtedly using a piece of his standard pitch as he makes the rounds of major board rooms in Southern California, seeking contributions ranging from $500,000 down to a minimum of $100,000. “I think if we do it, it will almost automatically, instantly, be the major festival--in no small part because of last year. . . .”

As Fitzpatrick and company seek corporate help, they are emphasizing that they’re only interested in “new money,” donations that don’t cut into contributions to existing arts organizations. “Many corporations, who like the idea (of a festival), want to transfer money from other arts groups, and we have turned them down,” Kindel said. “Both Bob and I are interested in the health and well-being of arts groups.”

At the same time, Fitzpatrick noted, they’re seeking corporate donors who are not competitive with each other.

After the blue-ribbon committee supported the concept of a second festival at a late-afternoon meeting at the Regency Club last October, Fitzpatrick’s festival hopes declined. The fifth member of the committee is Bill Lund, a real estate developer and chairman of the Orange County Performing Arts Center.

“There was a period in January and February when I felt we were running out of time, that it was not going to be possible,” Fitzpatrick said, indicating that it was Mayor Bradley who pulled him back from the near brink of despair.

“He’ll pick up the phone every two weeks and say, ‘Don’t give up; we’re going to have a festival.’ I called him in February and said, ‘Tom, I have concluded it is almost impossible. We’re not going to get it together,’ and he said, ‘I won’t hear it; I just will not accept it. . . .’

“Tom has gone with me on some of the corporate solicitations,” Fitzpatrick added. “He considers it that important. On one particular day, on 30 minutes’ notice, he said, ‘All right, I’ll be there at 12:15,’ and came with me to talk to the CEO.”

Instead of a 10-week festival like the Olympic Arts Festival, Fitzpatrick figures four weeks. Instead of a late-spring-into-summer event (June 1-Aug. 12, 1984), he is leaning toward a late-summer-to-early-fall time frame. “We’re looking at the mid-September to mid-October period,” Fitzpatrick said in his office at CalArts in Valencia. (He is president of the school.) “Some of the major arts companies that I am in preliminary negotiations with have indicated that that date would be possible.” (He won’t say which companies.)

Fitzpatrick, who has found an additional career as an international arts consultant ranging from the Australian Bicentennial in 1988 to the Chicago Worlds Fair in 1992, asserts that he will make a major effort to bring in performing arts companies from the Soviet Union and the Eastern European countries that had shunned the 1984 Summer Olympics.

“It would not be the Moiseyev,” he replied with a flicker of mystery. He will also go after the South and Central Americans--only Brazil was represented last time. There is plenty to choose from, he indicated. “A host of companies from England, France and Germany have never been seen in the United States.”

Pina Bausch’s West German avant-garde dance troupe, which opened the Olympic Arts Festival, will undoubtedly have a return engagement “with completely new works, because I think that was one of the most interesting performances. . . . Thousands (who) missed it kicked themselves,” but the Royal Opera, Circus Oz and indeed a substantial number of the 145 performing arts companies (from 18 countries) who were also there will not return next time. In 1987, Fitzpatrick added, the emphasis will be “heavier on the performing arts and lighter on the visual arts because there’s too little time (for) museums and galleries. . . .” No French Impressionists, “but in 1989,” he smiles, “one could reverse that process. That’s the advantage of a rolling thing.”

Meanwhile, he waits.

Kindel, when asked whether she thought there would be more arts festivals, reflected the attitude of this crew: “I’m determined. . . . And if Festival 2 is a success, then we’ll try for Festival 3. . . .”