A Hush-Hush Organization Is Now Making Some Noise
After five years of keeping a very low profile, the Trusteeship for Women is finally looking for attention. The Trusteeship is that hush-hush organization of high-powered women--an organization whose main purpose is the “bringing together of eminent women.” Some major names involved--attorney Cynthia Maduro Ryan, Public Works Board president Maureen Kindel, architect Julia Thomas, advertising exec Adrienne Hall, Fran Savitch (assistant to Mayor Tom Bradley), and entertainment and TV execs Barbara Corday and Sherry Lansing. (This supposedly local group of about 90 women has also had as members Jihan Sadat and the Olympics’ Monique Berlioux.) But, for a $225 registration fee, the three-day conference set for Feb. 20 with the Committee of 200 (an organization of top businesswomen) looks like what might be offered to a service club. It includes one night called “an evening with the moguls and mavericks of the entertainment community,” a morning tour of the set of a major TV series and a meeting with the producer and cast, lunch at a studio commissary, and what is billed as an afternoon screening of a newly released film, which turns out to be “Down and Out in Beverly Hills,” out now a month. There is “an evening with America’s favorite faces . . . at Chasen’s, a Hollywood entertainment community favorite.” But what time does the tour to Disneyland leave?
SURE ‘N’ SOMETHING--Beverly Hills plans to paint the town green March 16--and it is just a perfect example of what an average small town can do to celebrate St. Paddy’s Day. Get a hometown girl--like Constance Towers of “Capitol”--to lead the pre-parade crowd in a planned Guinness Book of World Records-sized sing-a-long of “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling.” Get a hometown boy like Gene Kelly to be the grand marshal. Have an “emerald green carpet specially woven with Dupont Antron” on which more than 100 celebs, 14 bands, 15 floats, 10 novelty acts, etc. will head down Rodeo Drive. Sparkplugs include TV’s Ed McMahon, restaurateur Jimmy Murphy and special events whiz Mario Machado--who’s volunteering his technical know-how. The parade, according to Machado, will boost a float sponsored not by a corporation--although they’ve got a bunch of those--but by an individual, Contessa Cohn, “making it perhaps the only parade in the world that can claim such support from private individuals.” The First Couple are the day’s honorary chairs, and a portion of the ticket sales for seats along the route go to charities like the Maple Center, the Bev Hills “Meals on Wheels” program and the Irish Cultural and Heritage Assns.
SHARING SUCCESS--Yes, everybody loves the SHARE ladies, who with their annual Boomtown Show raise more than $1 million to “improve life for the mentally retarded.” In fact, this week, SHARE--Share Happily And Reap Endlessly--contributed $200,000 toward research and clinical programs for the mentally retarded at the UCLA School of Medicine. At a special luncheon at the Faculty Club, Madlyn Rhue and Judy Feder, SHARE prexy, presented the check to Dr. Sherman Mellinkoff . . . . Earlier this week, the crowd turned out not to a rehearsal hall, but to a bookstore, Brentano’s in Bev Hills, to celebrate the publication of dancer-turned-writer Neile McQueen Toffle’s “My Husband, My Friend.” The party was put on by her SHARE buddies Suzanne Merrill, Delores Narr Nemiro and Nikki Dantine Bautzer. . . . One last note--at least ‘til the rush before the May 17 show at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium--SHARE, with just 70 members, has on its roster a former Miss America, Mary Ann Mobley, a Miss Universe, Corinna Fields and Marjorie Wallace, a Miss World.
ON THE STREETS--The remarkable Downtown Women’s Center for 10 years has been a source of refuge to women on the streets on Skid Row. Now, with the first Women’s Residence getting ready to be opened, they’ve joined with another downtown force--the May Co.--to raise needed funds. It’s the ’86 California Woman Walk-a-Thon, set for March 16--that’s a Sunday--and walkers will get friends to each pledge $2-a-kilometer for the 10K walk from May Co.’s new Seventh Market Place at Citicorp Plaza. Rarely does a event like this come up with a slogan that really brings it all home--”If you have a home to return to tonight, walk for women who don’t” . . . The Skid Row Development Corp.’s new support group, The 300 Club, hosts a gala reception at the L.A. Athletic Club on Thursday. It’s all to bring attention to the $300,000 fund-raising effort for Transition
House, which provides temporary housing and counseling for the homeless.
CORNER TABLE--Margaret Brock, at her regular corner table at the L.A. Country Club, got a quick stop-by from insurance exec Bill Hooper this week. She’s got her hands full, with a full array of GOP events this spring, including Sen. Howard Baker appearing before the Young Republicans dinner at the Beverly Wilshire on March 3. But, surprise, the talk was about sitting together at a deficit-dinner for City Atty. Jimmy Hahn, with Hooper explaining, “He’s a Democrat. But he’s a conservative.”
HONORED--Nick and Edna Stewart, the founders of the Ebony Showcase Theater, the oldest black theater in L.A., receive the Pioneer Award at the annual Black History Celebration of the Dignity Center. Dr. Horace Mitchell, vice chancellor of student affairs at UC Irvine, speaks; and Mayor Tom Bradley will gets the Heritage Award. The Dignity Center is a counseling program of the Institute for Studies of Destructive Behavior and the Suicide Prevention Center in South L.A.
NATIONWIDE AEROBICS--We thought we heard it all in the world of charity benefits. But this Saturday, Flexatard’s Gilda Marx emcees what’s billed as “the world’s largest fitness class ever, Superclass,” a satellite class to participating clubs and closed-circuit sites. For a minimum donation of $10, the huffers and puffers benefit the Nancy Reagan Drug Abuse Fund.
