Dodgers Have a Ball Making a Rock Video

The Dodgers are dancing. OK, maybe not at Dodger Stadium, but recently 18 of the players were singing and dancing in front of the chic Venice eatery, 72 Market Street. It was rock video time (yeah, yeah, like the “Super Bowl Shuffle”). Also singing along--Mayor Tom Bradley, Donna Mills, Joan Van Ark and the Commodores. The beach block of Market Street, between the Screening Room and Tony Bill’s restaurant, was made over into a nightclub scene for the video, to be released in the fall. After all, this is L.A. . . .

It was the luck of the scheduling. That’s how Supreme Court Chief Justice-designate William H. Rehnquist came right from his headline-grabbing confirmation hearings to play a little oceanside tennis here. Lucky for Pepperdine, which invited the justice a year ago for a two-week stay as a distinguished visiting professor of law. Saturday night, Rehnquist, his wife, Nan, and about five dozen good friends of Pepperdine got together on the terrace of Brock House to sip Sparkling Cider before dinner and catch a little of the Malibu sunset. No politics, just socializing, as Pepperdine Regent Leonard Straus and his wife, Dorothy, talked about heading east in September for the 350th birthday of Harvard (where the Thrifty chairman went to law school).

President David Davenport told the guests, seated on folding chairs for an informal dinner, that he now knew how to get board members to attend: “Invite Justice Rehnquist.” Listening as Rehnquist praised “a very fine law faculty and a first-rate student body” were long-time Pepperdine supporters Margaret Martin Brock, Glen and Gloria Holden and, of course, Chancellor Charles Runnels and wife Amy Jo. Former Chancellor Norval Young insisted that the tennis court would be renamed “The Supreme Court.” The event proved an informal kickoff for Pepperdine’s 50th anniversary year, beginning officially in September. The current fund-raising effort has been termed “The Wave of Excellence,” and so the anniversary celebration will be called “On the Crest of a Golden Wave.”

DANISH PASTRY--Camilla Soeberg, the 20-year-old star of the new film “Twist and Shout,” might be a Danish import. But she will look very familiar to some folks in Pasadena and Big Bear, since she was an exchange student here five years ago.

SPLISH, SPLASH--What were all those famous chefs and food fanciers doing in Piero Selvaggio’s pool Sunday afternoon--and with their clothes on? Why it was a surprise birthday party, at his own home, for the owner of Primi and Valentino. So Spago’s Barbara Lazaroff, the Balloon Express’ Shelly Balloon (yes, that’s her legal name), Wally’s Antoinette Alexander, and Piero’s steady, Stacy Dalgeish, put together a party that was hot, hot until the pool cooled it off. Trumps’ Michael Roberts just watched as Steve Wallace, Wolfgang Puck (in tennis whites), Jerry Goldstein (now gone from Acacia Winery, but wetting up for another project) and his fiancee, Rita Garabedian--all fully clothed--ended up in the pool.

Restaurateur Michael McCarty escaped. After all, he had brought Piero home after their regular tennis game--and maybe the second biggest surprise was to see Kim McCarty, with 2-week-old daughter Clancy at home, looking more like a teen-age baby sitter than a new mom. Screaming and splashing didn’t seem to bother the always elegant Cecilia Chiang. Sitting at pool side, she commented: “Nothing surprises me. After all, I’ve been in the restaurant business for years.”

PRETTY, PRETTY--OK. Want a pretty party. Get a society florist as your co-chair. That’s what Friends of Robinson Gardens did. Their August Moon party is Saturday, and already David Jones is planting the Beverly Hills estate with white. He promises live swans in the pool--along with live music from Joe Moshay. The money raised will go to restore the estate. How much is needed? “Honey, it would be endless,” admitted Jones, who promised that the party would be much the way the late Mrs. Robinson’s annual event was.